


a whisper and a calamity

by Authoress



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: M/M, Magical Shenanigans, Supernatural Creatures, and honestly oikawa isn't okay with that, badass dragons, based on yaboykeiji's work, college age characters, everyone has the magic bug except kindaichi, how to get rid of your dragon, kenma is generally unhelpful, magician/demon au, never trust demon familiars, oikawa is damn tired of all these kids, the bad guys are way cooler than the good guys, underdog heroes, why is every ghost a snarky asshole
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-22
Updated: 2016-03-08
Packaged: 2018-03-31 16:03:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 19,826
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3984205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Authoress/pseuds/Authoress
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oikawa is halfway through typing the query 'what to feed dragon demons' when it occurs to him that no one on the <i>planet</i> knows what a dragon should eat, or even knows that they exist, and all he's going to get are results for fantasy roleplay sites for twelve-year-old boys who don't have any friends.</p><p>He really needs better friends. </p><p>  <i>(Or, the story of how a skeptic becomes a believer, loners become a team, and the fate of the world rests firmly on the efforts of a few scraggly kids against their ridiculously photogenic enemies.)</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Case of Oikawa Tooru I

**Author's Note:**

> i know, i know. everyone and their mother is trying their hand at [**yaboykeiji's au**](http://yaboykeiji.tumblr.com/tagged/dragon-au) and i'm no different. i also should NOT be starting a new multichap fic while bfmtias is unfinished but ehhhhh.
> 
> um, i'm trying to stay as true to the new headcanons that the creator comes up with while also sticking to the plot i have developed. i hope that's okay!
> 
> final notes: as is obvious even from the outset, i'm trying this thing called not writing chapters three times the length of normal fic. they should be shorter, and as a result, this fic will update MUCH quicker than bfmtias! i'm also dividing each plot point of this fic into mini-arcs, beginning with The Case of Oikawa Tooru. 
> 
> enjoy!

Oikawa takes the largest, most obnoxiously deep breath he can, and flops backwards onto Kageyama’s couch, crinkling his nose when the couch wheezes at his weight with a puff of dust. Behind him, Kageyama sighs, soft but still audible, and waves some of the dust away with his hand. Oikawa looks from the faded red and olive green plaid of the couch, to the dingy lightbulb overhead, to the shelves with a broad assortment of jars and containers and boxes and frowns harder. “Your place is a dump, Tobio-chan.”

Kageyama doesn’t look up from where his fingers skim peeling yellow labels in some scrawled English that hurts Oikawa’s eyes just to look at, let alone read. Come to think of it… “Can you even _read_ those labels?”

A frustrated exhale. Kageyama spins around and fixes Oikawa with a mild glare. “ _Yes_ , I _can_ , and I’d appreciate it if you’d stop referring to my parent’s antique shop as a _dump_ , Oikawa-san.”

“I tutored you in English,” Oikawa replies drily. “You _suck_ at other languages.”

Kageyama’s ears flush. “I’m learning!” He snaps. “Didn’t have to know any English before now…”

Oikawa flips to his belly and watches Kageyama sound out the labels, brows pulled tight together in concentration, lips forming the foreign syllables with distaste. “Speaking of,” Oikawa grumbles. “If this hobby of yours is so difficult, why don’t you just drop it already?”

Kageyama drags his hands down his face and lets out a tortured moan. “Oikawa-san,” he starts. “If you don’t like my ‘hobby’ so much, then why are you even here? I didn’t even invite you to follow me back here.” He looks up and blinks, puzzled. “How _did_ you get back here?”

Oikawa taps his sneakers together cheerfully. “Your mom let me through! Said that she was so glad I was here since you’re failing Japanese Lit. or something.”

 _Mother…_ Kageyama despairs for a moment. “Okay, but _why_ are you here?”

“To convince you to come back to the science honor society, of course,” Oikawa replies. “We need your help, Tobio. The STEM team competition is only two months away! There’s no good replacement for you; you’re the best chemistry major we have.” _Even if you’re struggling in all your other classes…_

“I don’t understand why you keep dabbling in this pseudoscience instead of the real, proven stuff,” Oikawa laments, looping his arms over the arm of the couch.

He’s further disheartened when a small smile grows on Kageyama’s face, a distant look in his eyes as he stares at some creepy red jelly. Then he snaps out of the trance and turns back around to Oikawa, sitting on the ground in front of the couch. “It’s not pseudoscience,” Kageyama sighs with the heaviness of having had this conversation many times before. “It’s _magic_.”

“It’s a cult,” Oikawa grunts, slumping back and glaring miserably at Kageyama. “They’ve taken my cute kouhai and turned him into a brainwashed zombie talking about fantastical stuff like _magic_ and _witches_.”

The side of Kageyama’s mouth quirks. “Who’s they?”

“Just…just _they_ ,” Oikawa mutters petulantly. “If magic is so real, then make me into a millionaire, right now.”

Kageyama raises an eyebrow. “It doesn’t work like that, Oikawa-san.” He hops back up onto his feet, pushing off his knees. “Now, if you’re going to stick around and mope because I’ve taken a liking to the occult, then please do it quietly. I have some ingredients to sort.”

“Double, double toil and trouble; fire burn and cauldron bubble,” Oikawa quotes sulkily.

“Shakespeare’s _Macbeth_ ,” Kageyama calls over his shoulder. “You can tell my mother that I don’t need tutoring.”

Oikawa doesn’t have anything against the antique shop itself—the place has that warm, lived-in feel that would be off-putting in any other shop but makes Oikawa feel right at home among shelves of porcelain figurines and ticking clocks hanging on the walls. It’s covered in a fine layer of dust—as all good antique shops should be—but Kageyama’s mom is young and helpful to the customers, bringing with her the hospitality of the 21st century. The lucky cats in the window beckon in locals and tourists alike, even if it’s just to chat with the Kageyama family.

In the back, they store more delicate items and overstock, as well as the most valuable merchandise that can only be viewed by serious patrons. That’s where Oikawa usually finds Kageyama, the muscle of the family, lifting boxes and taking stock of all their junk to be sold and switched around as his parents dictate. But lately, Kageyama has been keeping to the delicate stores, whispered English words under his breath and a certain heaviness to the room.

Oikawa doesn’t really see the appeal of hanging out in the dusty, dingy storeroom with preserved eyeballs and snakes kept in formaldehyde when there are girls to chase in the ‘outside world,’ or at least, friends to go to karaoke with. Not that Kageyama had been too into the whole party scene before his occult craze, but still! At least he got out. Oikawa swears he can see Kageyama’s skin beginning to pale from lack of sunlight.

Kageyama makes a small, pleased noise and snatches up some sticks of incense in a cup victoriously, inhaling them deeply. The result is a coughing fit that has him doubling over, and Oikawa snorts and sits up. He’s made up his mind to leave and just give up on Kageyama altogether (even though finding someone else to fill his spot at their university would be a _pain_ ) when he sees it. A stereotypically heavy tome bound in leather and massive bronze clasps in the shape of dragon heads.

_There’s no way that isn’t important._

Oikawa slinks off the couch and slides stealthily towards the book. Kageyama, having recovered from his coughing fit, stands up only for his elbow to knock over a sealed jar of what might have been frog eggs. A smell comes from the smashed jar and Kageyama curses colorfully, leaning over again to minimize the damage. Oikawa unfreezes and continues to sneak over to the table, snatching the brick of a book up and nearly dropping it because of the weight. Huffing quietly, he blows a little dust off the cover.

All at once, the light streaming in through a dirty window flares and a breeze kicks up in the storeroom, fluttering some loose leaf papers and carrying unintelligible whispers right past Oikawa’s ears. He pauses, eyes wide. “Did…you hear that?” Oikawa asks tentatively.

Kageyama doesn’t reply, just hurls a “ _fucking_ slimy bullshit, this is why I didn’t take biology” over the couch and the hair on the back of Oikawa’s neck lies flat again. He actually looks back down at the book, where the bronze clasps twist into the shapes of two Eastern dragons across the magma red of the cover. It feels somehow _alive_ to Oikawa, warm as living thing, like it should move to draw breath. There’s no title to the tome, just a blue sticky note with unfamiliar scrawl on it warning Oikawa that the book contained ‘shit you SHOULD NOT fuck with yet – K.’

Well. That sounded fun.

Oikawa flips the book open to a place tabbed by what seemed to be a strip of crocodile hide or something equally as scaly. _Wow~_ , Oikawa thinks. _Whoever put this book together sure did want it to look legit. I’m impressed._ The tabbed page reveals a second sticky note covering up the title of the section. ‘How To Summon Things You Shouldn’t,’ it reads, and Oikawa has to hold back a snicker. He is strangely fond of the previous owner and their warnings. Thankfully, the book is in Japanese, unlike the labels in the storeroom, and he has no trouble confirming that yes, this section seems to be about summoning things. Inanimate objects, bolts of lightning, a divine wind…oh! That’s more interesting.

Oikawa turns the page on summoning familiars—living beings. For a cultish load of pseudoscience, the book was pretty in-depth. And actually, most of the items needed for the summonings were pretty commonplace. A thought occurs to Oikawa. Say…if Kageyama was forced to come face-to-face with evidence that magic wasn’t real, wouldn’t he be forced to abandon the hobby and come back to club? A wicked smile grows on Oikawa’s face. _One way to find out._

He snaps the book closed and trots across the room, concealing it behind his back. “Well, it’s been fun, Tobio-chan,” he says breezily. “But that icky stuff is starting to smell and I’m not fond of your potty mouth. So…bye! Call me when you want to come back to _real_ science!” He darts out of the room before he can hear Kageyama’s reply, a plan forming in his mind.

 

\------------------------------------

 

Back in his apartment, Oikawa clicks the video camera into place on the tripod, adjusting the window to capture the entirety of his bedroom floor where he’s sitting cross-legged, surrounded by an assortment of materials, the tome in his lap. His usual sleep shirt (Aliens Against The Patriarchy) has been discarded in favor of the one with the Ghostbusters logo on it. He clears his throat and presses play, allowing a shit-eating smile to cross his face. “Ya~ho, Tobio-chan, missing this?” He holds up the book smugly. “No need to freak out, I won’t harm your weird book. I just want to prove a point to you.”

Oikawa sits back and gestures around him. “What I have here is all the materials necessary for a magic spell! Of course,” he adds, shrugging helplessly, “since magic isn’t real, I’m basically going to waste a lot of salt. You might’ve guessed by now, but this is an intervention. I am going to prove to you right here, right now, that magic isn’t real. And if you’d like to return to club, then I won’t tease you _too_ much. Promise.”

Oikawa opens the book with a rush of pages, settling on the sticky note page. “I thought long and hard about what spell I should perform, but out of all these, I thought the one labeled ‘How To Summon Things You Shouldn’t’ seemed the most promising.” He pauses for effect and can practically hear Kageyama take a deep breath of fear for Oikawa’s safety. “And, of all these spells, I thought the one that would be best to prove to you how all of this is bullshit would be the most complex one—a demon summoning. Or whatever the hell all this familiar crap is.” He brushes thick, yellow pages to the one with a snarling red beast with a cream colored mane that looks like it’s about to eat the summoner and holds it up to the camera. “See? Seems pretty scary. Luckily it’s not re~al.”

Oikawa lays the book down and hops to his feet, turning down the lights of his room until only the candlelight of the seven black candles illuminate the room with eerie solemnness. Oikawa feels a shiver of anticipation at the mood lighting and flickering shadows across his walls. “Spooky, huh? I’m getting a little bit of a chill. You better appreciate this video, Tobio-chan; I had to buy candles and the clerk looked at me really weird.”

He steps back into the light of the candles and grabs a container of salt from the floor. “The book suggests that I put a ring of salt around the sigil and inside the light of the candles to keep the demon contained. I thought I’d do it so you don’t get _too_ freaked out.” Oikawa sprinkles a healthy load of salt in a circle, grinning as he does. He pulls the drawing of the most complicated demon sigil he could find in the book and places it in the center of the circle. “There. That was a pain to draw, but it needed to be done in some fancy kind of ink or it wouldn’t work, and I don’t trust this old brick too much,” Oikawa explains, patting the book fondly.

The sigil itself was elegant and sweeping in its shape, a rather beautiful design. Thick, organic sweeps of the brush contrasted with smaller geometric shapes embedded in the sigil. Even Oikawa could admit that in was exquisite. “I think it’s rather nice,” Oikawa admits quietly. “I might actually keep the paper as a memory of this ridiculous phase of yours. Plus, it took me _two hours_ to get right.” The black of the sigil stares back at Oikawa, and he takes a deep breath.

“Okay, I’m not too fond of this part, but I’ll do it for you, Tobio-chan.” He draws his pocketknife out of his pocket and flicks the blade out. Bracing himself, Oikawa draws the blade across his palm and whimpers at the pain. “Ow, ow, _ow_ ,” he mutters. “That stings.” Very carefully, he lets his blood drip onto the paper, a few red splotches obscuring the design of the sigil. “The book says I can’t close the wound yet, since I have to make a blood bond,” he says quietly. “It’s infuriatingly complex for a load of shit.”

There’s something about the darkness and weightiness of the room that keeps him from speaking too loudly. The incense that he had started burning a while ago fills his nose and overpowers his senses. It actually starts to _feel_ like he’s performing a satanic ritual. The flames seem to hiss and sway towards the center of the circle, and his blood seeps through the paper, as dark as the dried ink. Oikawa feels a nagging sense of unease tug at the back of his mind, but his pride refuses to let him show weakness now. _If I’ve gone this far, I might as well finish the job._

He picks up the book before he can lose his cool, smoothing out the page as well as he can without dripping blood onto it. “I imagine you would have had trouble with this spell,” Oikawa says. “Given that it’s not in Japanese or English, but in Latin. I’m no expert, but my pronunciation is bound to be better than yours.”

He pauses, once more, and then dives in. The words fall from his lips foreign and twisting his tongue unpleasantly. They hang and dance through the air, wild and intangible but very _present_. Oikawa feels a pressure behind his eyelids, making them slide farther and farther closed until he reads the words in almost a trance-like state—not so much reading as just _feeling_ what words sound right to him and letting their syllables slip out his mouth. He can hear the flicker of the candles more vividly, the incense’s scent sharpening and almost cutting at his nostrils, an oppressive heat pressing down on his body, building up and making him sweat until he releases the final word.

When he finally finishes, panting and coated in a cold sweat, the flames still and the dark energy disappears from the room. Oikawa straightens up and opens his eyes fully, shaking himself from the trance. He drops the book to the floor and releases his hand from the tight grip he had had it in. “Well, that was uneventf—”

As soon as he loosens the grip on his fist, a wild wind blasts up from the circle, sweeping all of Oikawa’s furniture up in its wrath and flinging it against the walls. Then, it blows right through the walls, tearing down the structure of his apartment and ripping at his clothes, whipping across his body so violently he nearly stumbles. That invasive heat is present _again_ , but this time it is unbearably hot—hot enough to melt the skin off Oikawa’s bones and make each inhale feel like he’s breathing in pure heat and soot. Wait—no, he _is_ inhaling soot or smoke or something, he can’t see a damn thing when this wind is blowing everything to pieces and _where the fuck_ did all this smoke come from?

The smell of incense sharpens and blackens to the scent of a fire, its taste ashy in Oikawa’s mouth. The wind doesn’t die away, but it shifts behind him, encasing him in a powerful gale. In the eye of the storm, the incense-turned-smoke is so thick Oikawa can’t see, and he coughs, struggling to get his bearings. _A hallucination. Must be a hallucination. There’s no way my apartment is gone; I’m probably just having a vivid dream—_

His train of thought gets literally stopped in its tracks when he sees two glowing yellow slits through the smoke, much larger and higher than they should have been on any living creature. A guttural growl booms across the distance between them, echoing in Oikawa’s skull like suspiciously Tobio-sounding laughter. There’s a moment when he feels the floor drop out from under him and his stomach sinks so low it might have fled his body. _You fucked up, Tooru. You fucked up and you can’t even possibly comprehend how badly you’ve fucked up._

The eyes move closer, and with them, the shape obscured by the fog begins to become clear. Adrenaline, cold as ice, trickles down his spine and freezes his body before he can even decide if he wants to run or hide. This is true fear. This is the paralysis of every horror movie protagonist who messes with what he shouldn’t and pays for his mistakes. Oikawa only hopes the painfully rapid thudding of his heart kills him before this _creature_ does.

A noise, grating and scraping against Oikawa’s eardrums, comes from the beast, and he realizes this is probably some attempt at language or communication, and his jaw unhinges. He begins to babble. “O-Oh my god, I am so s-s-sorry, I’ll l-leave right away, oh my god, oh god, spare me, _please_ —”

At his words, the eyes grow in size and then narrow, and the horrific scratching speech reaches a fevered pitch of unmistakable anger, and the creature _roars_. Oikawa’s breath leaves his body and his legs crumple at the volume of the sound. The beast doesn’t _stop_ —instead, it continues to roar as it leaps at Oikawa. He utters a tiny cry of fear and throws up his arms in a fruitless attempt to protect himself.

The beast never hits him.

Its roar is cut off abruptly, and Oikawa looks up, dazed, only to find a blue glowing string emerging from the cut in his hand. No, it’s not a string—upon closer inspection, he realizes it’s a _chain_ , looping and swirling up and away from his hand, wrapping around the neck of the beast. _It’s a…_ Oikawa thinks in wonder. _It’s a dragon…_

The chain binds around its neck and the dragon snarls, clawing at its neck to free itself, but the bond is intangible and unbroken by its swipes. Oikawa only has a second to marvel at the size and grandeur of the creature before the chain glows a blinding blue and the wind is back, hurling Oikawa around like a ragdoll. He squeezes his eyes shut and curls into the fetal position to protect himself until the wind dies away again. When he opens his eyes, he’s back in his apartment—still intact—with some of the lingering smoke diffusing through the open door.

He almost starts laughing hysterically with relief, allowing his shoulders to slump and the fear to subside. But before he can get the logical part of his brain back online to assess the situation, he becomes aware that he’s not the only occupant of his room when he hears a low rumble of a growl. Fearfully, Oikawa turns around and meets the black eyes of a supremely pissed demon.

“What the hell.” The deep rumble takes on a voice and words in heavily accented Japanese. In the center of Oikawa’s circle sits not a dragon, but a humanoid _thing_ with twin horns adorning its spiky crown of hair, a furiously whipping tail, and scaled plates covering its chest and arms and legs and—

Um. _He._

The not-dragon’s eyes burn into Oikawa’s. “ _You,_ ” he hisses with so much disdain Oikawa is amazed he doesn’t pee himself. “You fucking _summoner_ ,” he hisses louder. “Why am I not a dragon? How were you able to bind me to you?”

Oikawa opens and closes his mouth helpfully. The demon snarls impatiently and lashes out at Oikawa with claw-tipped fingers. Instinctively, Oikawa yelps and throws up his arms again. And again, the blue chain appears, wrapping around the demon’s neck and stopping him from completing the action. “ _Fuck!_ ” He roars, slamming his fist on the ground. “A _familiar’s_ spell?! Are you serious?”

Oikawa lowers his arms, tilting his head at the tattoo branding the base of the demon’s throat. It was a simplified design of the center of the sigil Oikawa had used to summon him. Oikawa looks to his hand and gasps. There, where he had cut himself, was a matching tattoo, and from the center of the design emerged the chain wrapped loosely around the demon’s neck, connecting at the center of his design.

He looks back up, meeting the demon’s eyes once more, and his jaw drops. _But if I summoned him here, then that means that magic is real. And if magic is real, then Tobio was right. And if Tobio was right, then that means this book is legit, which means the **spell** is legit, which means that…_ He closes his mouth and swallows, narrowing his eyes.

“Oh you have got to be fucking kidding me.”

 


	2. The Case of Oikawa Tooru II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OKAY, so this is still kind of setting the scene. i have this unfortunate habit of writing more than is necessary, so NEXT chapter will be the fun stuff. trying this thing called once a week updates?? i hope i can stick to it =v=b
> 
> but thank you everyone for the overwhelmingly positive response!! over 200 kudos on my first chapter of just over 3,000 words? wow. i hope you enjoy the rest of the ride!

If Oikawa’s perfectly honest with himself, these past two hours have been the worst of his life. It’s one thing to be judged by the cute girl at the shopping mart down the street for buying giant black candles, it’s another to get transported to another dimension because _hey guess what!_ Magic is real. But it’s another thing altogether to bring one of those horrible _reminders_ that magic is real out of their plane of existence to taunt Oikawa. _And_ he was chained to him like something out of a kinky porno.

Oikawa thinks that, after all he’s been through today, he deserves a fucking break from all this magical bullshit. He’s hit his limit.

Nodding to himself, Oikawa stands up and points at the demon, for lack of really anything else to do. “You’re not real,” he states confidently. _That’s right, maybe this is all a dream and I just need to find the way out of it…_

“Oh, fuck no,” the dragon demon growls, shaking his head slowly. “You do not _summon me from my domain_ —and as a _familiar_ of all things—to give me this ‘demons aren’t real’ sh—”

“You _can’t_ be real,” Oikawa speaks over him. “Because if you’re real, then that means Tobio-chan was right, and so in the process of trying to him look like an idiot, I—”

“Are you even listening to a word I’m saying?” The demon asks, incredulous.

“Shut up!” Oikawa yells, still pointing. “Illusions shouldn’t talk, so be quiet!”

“You—oh my god you’re fucking serious, literally _look at me!_ ” The demon snarls again, gesturing over his naked body. Oikawa makes a concentrated effort not to look at him, but it’s pretty hard to ignore the way the remaining candle flickers wildly, casting shadows across his body. The scaled patches glimmer in the low light and the outline of his muscles stands out even more. To Oikawa, he looks unfortunately very real and very angry.

“Dragons are real,” Oikawa breathes, testing the affirmation on his tongue. He pauses to let the words sink in, then bursts out laughing hysterically. “No, that’s ridiculous, that can’t be…” He stops laughing for a moment, looking at the dragon directly this time, then starts howling again, nearly falling off his feet.

“Oi,” the dragon hisses.

“There is a dragon—a _demon_ —sitting in my bedroom right now. Naked. This is—this is real life.”

“Oi.”

“But if dragons and demons are real then what about angels and fairies and werewolves and vampires? No, that’s all bullshit fantasy. But…magic is real, so those could also…”

“ _Oi_.”

“No! I haven’t exhausted all the possibilities that this isn’t just an elaborate trick of the incense or maybe—yes, that’s it! This is all a prank pulled by Tobio-chan, to have some person dress up as a _monster_ —”

The demon lurches forward, a clawed hand snatching Oikawa’s wrist and pulling him to the floor. Oikawa gasps at the contact—warm, so _warm_ —then at the sensation of falling, then again when on his back, he meets the furious eyes of the demon, lips curled in a snarl to reveal _fangs_. Oikawa scrambles back fearfully, but the demon’s grasp is strong.

“Let go of me!” Oikawa shrieks. “I put you in a salt circle! How the hell did you even escape it in the first place?”

The dragon snorts. “Usually, when one puts down a salt circle, they put the sigil paper—my _physical representation_ in this plane of existence—down first and _then_ sprinkle the salt around, you moron. And stop wriggling around or I really will hurt you!”

Oikawa stops his wriggling. It’s less out of fear at the dragon’s words, though, and more out of fear that his face would be scarred horribly when the demon clutches his chin in one hand, claws pressing uncomfortably against Oikawa’s very fragile, very human skin. The demon leans in closer to Oikawa, enough that he can see the black of his eyes, inhuman and cold. “Now you listen here, human—”

“You’re going to scratch my face,” Oikawa whines. “You can’t do that; I need it!” He paws ineffectively at the dragon’s hand, making increasingly more distressed noises. The demon gives him a look of incredulity.

“I can’t tell if you’re playing stupid or you actually summoned me by accident,” the demon confesses, letting go of Oikawa’s face with a grunt. “Either way, you’re annoying as hell, fuck.”

“Well of course I summoned you by accident!” Oikawa hisses, rubbing at his cheeks sullenly. “How was I supposed to know magic was real? This was all supposed to be a demonstration of how Tobio-chan was an idiot, and now you’ve gone and ruined all of it just by _existing_. Shit…you rubbed part of my jaw raw, you animal, do you know how long that takes to go awa—”

“I swear to My Lord Lucifer, if you call me an animal or a beast _one more time_ , I will gut you,” he rumbles. Oikawa pouts.

“And how exactly do you expect me to call you by a name if I have none to call you by? You didn’t exactly introduce yourself.”

“You didn’t exactly _knock_ on my door either, did you? And yet here I am, sitting in your world, cramped in this tiny, hideous and weak body, arguing with an imbecile—”

Oikawa sticks his tongue out at the demon. “Whatever, I know you can’t hurt me. Familiar’s contract or whatever the hell it’s called. Sucks _ass_ to be you. Luckily, I’m kind enough to actually want to know your name, so.” Oikawa looks at him expectantly. When the demon doesn’t say anything, Oikawa makes a gesture for him to take the floor, metaphorically.

“…You couldn’t possibly pronounce my true name,” the demon sniffs after a moment of contemplation. “But if you must call me by a name and not a title, then Iwaizumi will suffice.”

Oikawa’s jaw drops. “You’re a _dick_ ,” he concludes with amazement. “What are you, some kind of demon royalty to be waited on and referred to as His Eternal Evilness or something?” He snorts.

Iwaizumi gives Oikawa a look of amazement as well, but there’s a condescending edge to it. “You don’t know?” He almost laughs. “I am one of the High Demons of Hell—one of only a handful granted the title Archdemon.”

It occurs to Oikawa, again, that he has fucked up majorly. He’s pretty sure there’s no heavenly retribution that can save him from the wrath of an _Archdemon_ , and he’s also sure that said wrath is inevitable, given the way Iwaizumi’s claws are twitching like he wants to strangle Oikawa. ‘Regret’ doesn’t even begin to cover the emotion he feels towards this entire situation, and the certainty that his death lies at the end of this venture makes him feel very small and helpless.

“But if you didn’t even know _who_ you were summoning—” Iwaizumi starts.

“I’m sorry, okay?” Oikawa cries. “I didn’t mean to suck you out of your lair or wherever you were torturing souls of the damned or whatever it is that you do! I didn’t know that you were important! I didn’t even _want_ to summon you; I was just protecting myself.”

“You really don’t know a thing about magic, do you?” Iwaizumi sighs. “You don’t know anything about my world. You really shouldn’t have fucked with this kind of stuff.”

“Don’t you think I know that by now?” Oikawa snaps, scared.

“Don’t get mad at me, princess,” Iwaizumi scowls. “I’m not to blame for the situation at hand, you are. Which, by the way, as I was saying before, if you didn’t even know who you were summoning, _how_ were you able to summon me? Many, many people have tried, but calling an Archdemon out of Hell is no easy feat, especially for mortals.”

Oikawa shrugs weakly. “I just picked whichever sigil in the book looked the most impressive. It wasn’t supposed to work, so.” He shrugs again.

Iwaizumi pinches the bridge of his nose. “Okay, well, summoner—”

“My name’s Oikawa Tooru,” Oikawa grumbles a little petulantly.

“ _Tooru,_ ” Iwaizumi grinds out through gritted teeth, but pauses when he sees Oikawa startle and look at him like he’s seen a ghost. “Okay, _what_.”

“Don’t call me Tooru!” He squeaks. “That’s way too personal!”

Iwaizumi brushes a claw across the tattoo on his throat, and the chain flickers into view briefly. “We are bonded at the soul, yours to mine,” he murmurs. “I’m not sure how you get much more personal than that.” Oikawa sputters but can’t come up with a rebuttal.

“Tooru, it’s nearly impossible to summon someone like me. To bind them as a familiar is even harder. In fact, it’s been banned by the The Lightwood Society, the international organization of magicians. So for you, an untrained and ignorant human to do so, should be laughable,” Iwaizumi explains. “And yet, you have done just that. You won’t get caught either, damn you, because you aren’t a registered magician. We can’t rely on them for any help, not that we could anyway, considering you broke a law.”

Oikawa throws his arms up in the air in exasperation, but sighs. “What do you mean ‘we’? What do we need help with?”

“You _do_ want to dissolve this bond, don’t you?” Iwaizumi asks, raising an eyebrow.

“Oh, fuck yes,” Oikawa agrees. “As soon as possible.”

“Alright, well, since we can’t hope to dissolve it through magic, we’ll just have to carry the spell through.” Iwaizumi scratches behind his ear like a dog. “Familiar binds like this are only temporary—all I have to do is assist you in whatever task you summoned me for, and then we should be able to go our separate ways.” He looks at Oikawa. “For what purpose did you summon me?”

Oikawa opens his mouth, shuts it, and then pales considerably. “Ah, about that…”

Iwaizumi tenses and his gaze hardens. “Is there a problem?”

“Well…” Oikawa begins, rubbing his elbow and not making eye contact. “I summoned you in order to prove to Tobio-chan that magic isn’t real. But, um, seeing as it _is_ real…I don’t think you can help me out much.”

“ _Are you telling me_ ,” Iwaizumi hisses, low, and the feeling of at least temporary tolerance between them evaporates. “Are you telling me that you have trapped me in what is quite possibly the only case in which the familiar spell would _never wear off?_ ” His claws gouge large punctures into Oikawa’s floor, and the demon’s eyes seem to go a shade darker with malevolence.

“ _God dammit!_ ” Iwaizumi leaps to his feet, swinging his fist into the closest wall and blowing a hole near clean through it. His tail whips frantically, agitatedly behind him, knocking a lamp off Oikawa’s side table and the camera— _oh god the **camera** oh no_—

“My camera!” Oikawa cries out, too late as it smashes onto the floor. He runs over to it, where Iwaizumi had accidentally whipped it across the room, cradling it in his hands. _Well, there went all his proof that this was a real thing that happened…_

There’s a burst of pain at the base of his skull and Oikawa cries out. The ruined camera falls from his hands as Iwaizumi tangles his claw-fingers in Oikawa’s hair and yanks him back up. Oikawa whines at the pain, still burning white-hot and forcing tears into the corner of his eyes. Iwaizumi, practically dripping rage, pulls Oikawa face-to-face with him and exhales through his nose, hot and furious. Even with the security of the bond between them, Oikawa feels fear trickled down his spine, making his heart race and breath pick up.

“That’s right,” Iwaizumi fumes. “You _should_ be afraid.” His grip tightens and Oikawa screws his eyes shut, crying out.

When he opens them again, he feels a cold wash of shock. The blue of their chain is wild and bright between their bodies and his hand—the sigil— _burns._ If Iwaizumi’s panting and sweat dripping down his temples is any indicator, he feels it too. The chain is longer than before, long enough to wrap and bunch somewhere behind Oikawa’s head.

His blood runs cold.

“Figured it out, haven’t you?” Iwaizumi grins, fierce and deadly. “Not as stupid as I thought you were, then. Yes, I’m using all the power in my body to try and crush your skull in my hands. _That_ would certainly be one way to solve this issue, a dead summoner. Lucky for you,” he throws Oikawa to the ground, “I’m forced to abide by the rules like any other familiar.”

Oikawa clutches the back of his head, eyes stinging. “You’re awful,” he whispers, his own brand of deadly soft.

“Yeah? Well, how would you feel, being snatched up from your home and placed in the lap of some kid; a new toy for them to play with?” Iwaizumi snaps.

“You’re not a toy,” Oikawa replies, still whisper-soft. “When have I ever treated you as such?”

Iwaizumi looks distinctly uncomfortable. “Look, it’s just a terrible experience for demons overall, okay? We fucking _hate_ being forced into servitude. That’s why they had to add the protection over the summoner.”

“I’m not exactly thrilled about this either,” Oikawa mumbles. “It was an accident, I told you.”

Iwaizumi’s tail lashes. He was in the right, wasn’t he? It was practically his damn _birthright_ to be treated with respect and dignity, neither of which Oikawa had shown to him. He was alone in a world unpleasant and unfamiliar to him, and he only had this miserable creature as company. It was understandable that he snapped, right?

Except, it really wasn’t.

Oikawa turns back to the camera, hand falling from his head, suddenly exhausted. He stiffens, nearly jumps, when he feels a warm presence his back, his neck, the base of his skull. “Iwaizumi—” He gasps, but a hand at his elbow keeps him from turning.

“Sorry,” Iwaizumi apologizes gruffly, nosing over Oikawa’s neck and in his hair. “I…I got…scared, I suppose.”

_That’s all well and good_ , Oikawa thinks, _but what the **hell** are you doing to me now?!_ The attention paid to him didn’t feel bad by any means—it was soothing and gently warm and almost _affectionate_. Oikawa was mildly horrified to find that his dick was getting a tad interested in the events taking place. “What the f-fuck are you doing?” Oikawa breathes. _Fuck you, voice crack. Just…fuck you._

“Healing you,” Iwaizumi explains, sounding so unbothered by the situation that Oikawa feels the irrational urge to spin around and beat him with something heavy, like the spellbook. “Familiars can take on their summoner’s pain, even die for them. I figured it’s the least I could do since I…took out my frustration on you. You’re in much of the same situation as me, aren’t you?”

“Scared? Helpless? In way too deep? You take your pick,” Oikawa attempts to joke.

“Shouldn’t have said ‘scared,’” Iwaizumi laments, leaning away from Oikawa and groaning. “I’m not afraid of anything in this world—I’m afraid of what will happen in other places without my presence to keep things in balance.”

Oikawa turns, still wary, but willing to forgive. “You’re very important,” he states, but it’s hesitant. Doubtful. “We should get you back to Hell as soon as possible.”

“Yeah,” Iwaizumi agrees, and smiles crookedly (Oikawa doesn’t look too hard at it).

“We can try doing some research, see if something like this has happened before,” Oikawa offers, looking away. Unfortunately, he chooses to look down, right into the danger zone of—“ _Holy shit,_ Iwaizumi, you need to put pants on!”

“What? Why?” Iwaizumi looks down his body, then up at Oikawa, baffled.

“Your—your—oh my god do _not_ make me talk about your junk, just put on some clothes, you are a _human_ now,” Oikawa babbles.

“What are…pants?” Iwaizumi tilts his head to the side in genuine confusion.

“You’re screwing with me, right?” Oikawa asks, but the confused look doesn’t disappear, he sputters weakly, trying to think about how to explain the concept of _human decency_ to a creature who probably laid around, scandalous and bare in his domain, everything on display for the world to see…

“Do you feel threatened by my masculinity or something?” Iwaizumi asks, but Oikawa is too busy covering his face and erasing that image from his head to answer. “Do we need to compare male reproductive organs? Do I need to assure you that demons are just naturally larger?”

Oikawa looks up if just to scream at Iwaizumi to _shut up_ , but he’s biting his lip with those damn _canines_ of his, holding back a laugh that makes his body tremble. Not for the first time today, Oikawa feels his jaw drop.

“You are,” he hisses, “the _worst_ —”

“Oh, come on, I couldn’t pass up a perfect opportunity like that.” Iwaizumi lets the laugh out, rich and deep, and Oikawa has to come to terms with the fact that he is unfortunately just a little bit attracted to his accidental demon. It’s fine though—creatures of sin were naturally designed to encourage more sin, and Iwaizumi hated him anyway. No big deal. He would probably be able to keep it in his pants. If Iwaizumi actually put on some pants.

“ _Go_ ,” Oikawa insists, shoving the dragon in the direction of his drawers, steadily _not_ looking at his ass. “There are pants in there that will fit you for tonight, please just. Clothe yourself.”

Iwaizumi huffs but obeys, Oikawa taking the chance to dart into his bathroom to change and brush his teeth and piss and forget, if just for a moment, that things were really not okay. The Oikawa in the mirror looks thoroughly ruffled, pink high in his cheeks, and wild-eyed. All in all, he looks ravished, but that was just going to have to do for tonight. He could worry about looking like he’d had a wild night (the _fun_ kind) tomorrow.

Also the demon. He should probably worry about that, too.

“You can do this, Tooru,” he assures himself. “Just show him who’s boss. He’s your familiar, whether you like it or not. At least use it to your advantage.”

When Oikawa steps out, however, he realizes that taking charge would prove to be more difficult than anticipated. Iwaizumi had made himself right at home on Oikawa’s bed, big enough to swamp almost the entire mattress. Oikawa couldn’t deal with this.

Picking up a pillow, he smacked Iwaizumi on the head, careful to avoid his horns. Iwaizumi blinked open one frighteningly dark eye, making Oikawa jump. “Yes?” He prompted, amused.

“My apartment, my bed,” Oikawa ordered in his most assertive tone of voice. “You’re on the floor, demon scum.”

“And how do you plan to go about getting your way?” Iwaizumi asks, raising an eyebrow. _Shit._ Oikawa had hoped he wouldn’t ask for specifics.

“Just _go_ ,” he whines, and Iwaizumi yawns wide enough for Oikawa to count all his dangerously sharp teeth. “I’m way too exhausted to sleep on the freezing floor.”

“So just share with me,” Iwaizumi snorts. “I’m practically a space heater.”

“I can’t do that!” Oikawa protests wildly.

“Why not? Scared I’ll bite?” Iwaizumi taunts him. “C’mere.”

Iwaizumi tugs an unwilling and stiff Oikawa into his own bed, scooting over to give him room. Oikawa leans away from his touch almost fearfully at first, but his muscles scream at the exertion, and he eventually relaxes against Iwaizumi’s skin-scale hybrid of a hide. Iwaizumi makes a pleased purring noise and drapes an arm over Oikawa’s waist.

“You’re going to poke my eyes out with your horns,” Oikawa blurts, feeling all too close to the demon.

Iwaizumi groans. “It was so nice when you had stopped talking for like three minutes. No, my horns won’t poke you at all, you moron. If anything…” Oikawa doesn’t make a sound, biting his lip as Iwaizumi’s claws flatten against his stomach, pulling him just a little closer. “I can protect you easier like this, can’t I?” He suggests.

“You don’t want to protect me,” Oikawa protests.

“True,” Iwaizumi agrees. “But I do owe you for the very comfortable bed, I suppose.”

In the end, it’s the rustle of Iwaizumi’s exhales against the back of Oikawa’s neck that lulls him to sleep.

 


	3. The Case of Oikawa Tooru III

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> EXTREMELY LATE UPDATE, i know, i know. i want everyone to know that i have absolutely NOT abandoned this fic, bfmtias just had a recent spike in popularity and well, i update according to what gets the most attention. this chapter ends the mini-arc. it's also incredibly long in comparison to the other two chapters so take that as my apology??

The next morning sees Oikawa jumping into action to rid himself of his demon pest. He wakes before Iwaizumi and hops out of bed, Iwaizumi growling low in his throat when Oikawa pulls away from him, as if he’d lost his favorite teddy bear to sleep with. Oikawa pauses for a moment to snort at the way he scowls in his sleep, curling up tighter, catlike. But there was research to do and coffee to make, so Oikawa pads out of the room instead of watching the demon with a mixture of amazement and amusement.

The coffeemaker rumbles to life like a particularly grumpy old cat while Oikawa fires up his laptop. He’s not quite sure what to look for first, but googling ‘familiar spell reversal’ seemed like a pretty good place to start. He chews on a piece of toast with while tapping at the keyboard and scrolling through the results, most of which appeared to be a lot of bogus shit to scare kids or wikis for some fantasy book. Oikawa makes a frustrated noise at the same moment the coffeemaker clicks off. He eyes the pot warily. It was probably a black coffee day today.

When Oikawa returns to his room, balancing an open laptop and a coffee mug and carrying his second piece of toast in his mouth, Iwaizumi is barely stirring to life. Oikawa rolls his eyes and dumps his laptop on the bed, mug on the side table, before standing on his bed and rolling up the blinds. He gives the windows to his apartment a push, but they barely budge. He huffs and gives them a strong shove with his shoulder to the glass, and they fly open, taking Oikawa with them.

He makes an aborted yelp, the sound getting stuck somewhere in his throat, but before he can plummet to his death, there’s a strong grip around his wrist pulling him back. Iwaizumi blinks his eyes open sleepily and hauls Oikawa back inside and on his ass.

“M-Morning,” Oikawa squeaks, still seeing his life flash before his eyes.

“You’re insufferable,” Iwaizumi grumbles. “It’s way too early to be having to save my imbecilic summoner from falling out a _window_.” He winces at the light and slumps back onto his belly, half-laying across Oikawa.

“Get off!” Oikawa hisses. “Also, wake up! We have work to do!”

“Why do humans insist that hell is so awful,” Iwaizumi mumbles through a pillow, “when the real crime is that you don’t get to sleep in on earth?” Oikawa sits up and smacks him with the other pillow.

“You are so _lazy_ ,” he accuses. “Don’t you want to go home?”

“I want to _sleep_ without you causing a racket and letting the light stream in, but we can’t all have what we want, apparently,” Iwaizumi replies, voice still muffled.

“Just…drink some coffee or something, you _reptile,_ ” Oikawa sighs, exasperated. Oikawa pokes him in the side with a socked foot.

Iwaizumi turns his head to the side, eyeing Oikawa with one black eye, his pupil a thin slit of yellow. “Coffee?” Oikawa gestures at the mug with a raised eyebrow. Iwaizumi props his head up with his chin and snuffles with interest. “Smells good,” he murmurs, rising from the pile he had made of himself, wrapped around Oikawa. He grabs the mug with surprising delicacy considering the size of his claws and takes a sip, but recoils immediately.

“ _Ugh_ ,” he groans. “That’s _revolting_. What the hell do you use it for? You don’t really _drink_ it, do you?”

Oikawa quirks an eyebrow, smiling. “Yes, I do. But I only drink it black when I really need to be awake. You can put some creamer and sugar in if it’s too much for you to take.”

Iwaizumi glares at him. “Is that a challenge?”

Oikawa squints at him. “How on earth does _drinking coffee_ sound like a challenge to you?” Iwaizumi opens his mouth but Oikawa waves him off. “Nevermind, nevermind. Go to the kitchen and pour yourself some. Sugar’s in the cupboard and creamer’s in the fridge.”

Iwaizumi sniffs the coffee again with a look of betrayal, but stretches along the bed, popping muscles in his back and shoulders. Oikawa is relieved to see that although he had vehemently refused to wear a shirt, Iwaizumi hadn’t kicked his pants off while Oikawa was sleeping. The morning light falls soft on the planes of Iwaizumi’s back, the patches of shadow and highlights of gold turning him from beast to Apollo, bathing in the light like he owns it.

But then Iwaizumi yawns, exposing the rows of thick, draconic fangs that looked sturdy enough and sharp enough to pierce metal, and the illusion is shattered. Oikawa jerks his attention back to his laptop, only glancing up once as Iwaizumi stumbles sleepily from the room, scratching his ass, to remind himself that Iwaizumi was a heathen better off far from Oikawa. Another glance at the place where Iwaizumi had punched a hole through the wall fixes a scowl on his face.

“I don’t suppose you have a way of ‘magicking’ that better,” Oikawa sighs in irritation when Iwaizumi returns with another mug in his claws, gesturing at the damage. “I’m going to lose my deposit.”

Iwaizumi gives the wall the briefest of looks over and then shrugs. “Most of my magic is destructive in nature,” he replies simply.

“Of course it is,” Oikawa groans. The back of his neck prickles, and he looks up to see Iwaizumi staring at him with an expression Oikawa can’t quite decipher. “What?”

Iwaizumi points at his eye, and says softly, “I didn’t know you wore glasses.”

Oikawa feels for them self-consciously. “Yeah,” he mutters. “I usually wear contacts, but they get dry so at home I wear glasses…why?”

Iwaizumi offers a small, puzzled smile. “They’re endearing,” he says. “Makes you seem less like a self-righteous asshole.”

Oikawa sputters. “They’re not—you’re— _ugh_.” He buries his head in his hands. Iwaizumi flops on the bed next to him, slurping noisily at his coffee. Oikawa looks up to tell him to stop being so obnoxious or at least make some half-formed syllables protesting everything that has happened to him over the last 24 hours, but instead he just stares in horror at Iwaizumi’s coffee. “What did you _do_?”

The cup is nearly filled to the brim with sugar. It looks like Iwaizumi had just taken his sugar container and dumped it in the mug. Oikawa gapes in horror as Iwaizumi takes another sip of the sugary concoction from _hell_ , crunching on the sugar, and giving Oikawa an exasperated look. “What? You said to make coffee. This is way better than that tar you made.”

“You know what?” Oikawa says suddenly. “It doesn’t matter. Nothing matters. I’m going to find out how to banish you back home and then I’m repressing my memories of any of this happening. I can’t believe you have a _sweet tooth_.” He turns back to his laptop and furiously tries to ignore Iwaizumi eating sugar out of a cup.

“Why? It’s good,” Iwaizumi chirps, curling around Oikawa again and pillowing his head on Oikawa’s thigh, forcing Oikawa to shift his laptop to the the side. “I don’t deny myself the simple pleasures in life.”

Oikawa clicks on what must be the fifteenth website that was clearly run by a bunch of cult assholes who had no idea magic truly existed and had nothing that could help Oikawa out. Their ‘ritual’ didn’t even involve blood or Latin incantations, which seemed to be the very _basis_ of familiar spells. He feels a pang of misery. Why couldn’t _these_ be the spells Kageyama was into? Fake and harmless.

Iwaizumi tilts his head back to glance at the screen and Oikawa decides fuck it, he better just go back to the source of all his problems for inspiration of what to do. But first, to shove the overly touchy and overly spiky lap cat off. “If you don’t like me,” he begins, “why are you lying on me all the time?” Oikawa shoves at Iwaizumi fruitlessly.

“You smell like magic,” Iwaizumi replies. “Well…at least more than anything else I’ve encountered so far.”

“Ew,” Oikawa says, wrinkling his nose. “I don’t want to smell like magic.”

“Too bad,” Iwaizumi snorts, flicking him across the nose. “You’ve got some pretty strong stuff attached to you now.”

“You’re really weird,” Oikawa says when Iwaizumi draws his hand away. It’s not meant to be a jab; Oikawa is simply making an observation. “I can’t puzzle you out at all.”

“Oh? Were you expecting me to pull a pitchfork out of my ass and poke you with it while cackling maniacally?” Iwaizumi raises an eyebrow.

That surprises a laugh out of Oikawa. “That would probably make me feel better,” he admits. “You’re so weird in that you’re not pissed at me anymore. In your place, I would have been furious, harassing my summoner night and day to fix the problem.”

“Well, I guess we’re just different,” Iwaizumi says with a shrug. “I was angry at first…but there’s really nothing that can be done about it now. If there’s one thing I’ve learned from hundreds of years of experience, it’s that getting mad and pushing people around doesn’t get anything accomplished. It just produces sloppy work and even more headaches. I’d rather work with you than waste my energy being a big scary demon.” He grins. “Besides, I’ve never been on earth before. Might as well enjoy the vacation.”

“Oh yeah, that’s another thing!” Oikawa exclaims. “You know what glasses and internet are, but you didn’t know what coffee was? You have a strange, scattered knowledge of human things. I don’t get it.”

“We don’t have use for the same things in Hell as you do here, I guess,” Iwaizumi shrugs. “I don’t really know? Maybe there’s coffee in Hell, but I happen to live in a very reclusive domain so that no one will bother me. I’m not as up-to-date with human shit.”

“Oh my god,” Oikawa groans. “I summoned a demon _redneck_.”

Iwaizumi grins at that, but doesn’t deny it.

 

\------------------------------------------------

 

Over the next week, Oikawa doesn’t leave his apartment. He calls in sick at university, figuring he can take maybe two weeks off from class before he’ll really start to struggle. All of Oikawa’s energy goes toward reversing the damage he had done. Iwaizumi, despite preferring to laze around all day, occasionally helps Oikawa out with the searches for a way to remove the familiar spell. He can tell immediately what websites are scams, and although Oikawa is initially skeptical, they do find a few blogs or simple websites from legitimate magicians detailing the history of the familiar-binding spell and attempts at performing the spell.

They don’t find any way of dissolving it other than what they already knew, but it’s a start. Both Oikawa and Iwaizumi feel confident that there’s something out there or some kind of similar experience that they can find—all they have to do is look.

Of course, even with the search going smoothly, plenty of other things don’t. It doesn’t occur to Oikawa until it’s too late that keeping a demon in a confined space might be pretty difficult. For one thing, they don’t always see eye to eye.

“Iwaizumi!” Oikawa snaps, storming into ‘their’ bedroom, where Iwaizumi is perched on his bed, staring at the television with rapturous attention. “How many times do I have to fucking tell you to turn the volume down? No one in my god damn apartment complex wants to hear _The Exorcist_ blasting through the walls at 1 AM!”

Iwaizumi rolls his eyes and presses the pause button. He glares at Oikawa. “I am _trying_ to reconcile what humans think demons are with what we _actually_ are, thank you very much. It’s grossly fascinating. What do I care what a bunch of idiot humans think of my movie tastes?”

“ _I care!_ ” Oikawa yells. “I care, because we’re _both_ going to be evicted and on the streets if you can’t abide by the curfew! For god’s sake, can’t you just obey the house rules I set down?”

“I’m not a dog,” Iwaizumi snaps, jumping to his feet and storming toward Oikawa. “Stop treating me like some pet who has to do as you say.”

“It has nothing to do with being a pet and everything to do with common courtesy!” Oikawa snaps back, not backing down. They butt heads literally, glaring each other down from where their foreheads connect, Iwaizumi letting a deep growl escape. “You’re not doing yourself any favors, snarling like that,” Oikawa snorts. “It just makes you sound more like an animal.”

Iwaizumi roars, a sound that would have deafened the television if it were playing. Oikawa’s knees shake, but he doesn’t give in, knowing that Iwaizumi was just being a bully to get his way. “You _will_ respect me,” he hisses.

“Sure, as soon as you start respecting my house rules,” Oikawa hisses back. “Shut up and go to sleep.”

(Oikawa slumps into a chair that night, fighting back frustrated tears about how this just _wasn’t fair_ , having his apartment taken over and stressing about the whole situation while Iwaizumi just screwed around all day and refused to take him seriously.)

He wakes the next morning with a kink in his neck and a polite rapping at the door. Oikawa stirs into action very slowly, rubbing his sore neck and crusted eyes, calling “jus’ a min’te” sleepily. But before he can even stand up, Iwaizumi appears from the kitchen and walks up to the door, opening it.

“Hello?” Iwaizumi greets pleasantly.

It then occurs to Oikawa that one, Iwaizumi is a demon, two, the person at the door is his landlady, and when put together, they created a recipe for unimaginable disaster. He bolts to his feet, pushing past the wave of vertigo to call out “Iwaizumi, wait, _no_ —” but it’s too late to do anything but watch and despair.

Oikawa’s landlady looks at Iwaizumi with the kind of shock and awe that makes Oikawa squeeze his eyes shut to hide from the accusations of _what is that **thing**_ …but they never come. He blinks his eyes open. The landlady looks awestruck, yes, but there’s a completely inappropriate blush on her face as she takes in Iwaizumi— _horns, tail, and claws missing_ —standing with a slight cock to his hips and an equally cocky smile on his lips. He’s still half naked in boxers that really do nothing to hide—

“H-Hi,” Oikawa’s landlady says almost _shyly_ , and Oikawa finds himself in a whole different kind of deep shit. She’s doing a great job of looking at his face and not anywhere else, though, Oikawa has to give her props. She glances at Oikawa with wide eyes. “Um, I’m here to see Oikawa-san…”

Iwaizumi glances over his shoulder and gives Oikawa the smuggest look he’s ever seen. “It’s for you, babe,” he says.

Oikawa wants to sink in the floor. He wants to die. He wants _Iwaizumi_ to die. He wants his landlady to stop looking like she’s walked in on the world’s greatest secret. But he also wants to keep his apartment, so he sulks over to the door and puts on his best ‘I’m very apologetic and also hot so you should forgive me’ smile. “I’m so sorry Hoshizawa-san,” he says. “This is about last night, isn’t it?”

The innuendo slips out before Oikawa can bite it back, and Hoshizawa-san gets even _more_ red in the face. “Iwaizumi wasn’t aware of the curfew when he _put on the movie_ ,” Oikawa covers desperately. “It won’t happen again.”

She nods a little more than is strictly necessary, still looking between them like she’s stumbled onto a jackpot. “You’re…a good tenant, Oikawa-san,” she says. “Just mind the curfew. And, um, if you’re planning on having a…partner…over for a long period of time, we’ll have to change the contract next month…”

“He’s not!” Oikawa blurts out. “He’s not, um, my partner.” It’s the flimsiest truth he’s ever told in his life.

“…Okay,” Hoshizawa-san says, but this time with laughter in her eyes. “Well, if things change, just remember to let me know…”

When Oikawa can finally close the door, he slumps against it and slides to the floor, groaning the whole way. “Great,” he mumbles. “If I wasn’t already the gossip of the entire complex, now I’ll _really_ be…”

“Oh come on,” Iwaizumi snickers. “It was kind of funny.”

Oikawa glares at him, still sore from their fight last night. “Why are you up, anyway? Don’t you have some eighteen hours of sleep to get and a day to waste?”

The humor leaves Iwaizumi’s face, replaced by something remorseful and soft. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I could smell your stress and pain from the other room. It kept me up for hours, but my pride was still too great for me to apologize. I keep forgetting that I’m a guest here, and that I should treat you with the same respect I would another of my kind, even if you’re just a human.”

It’s a clumsy apology, and there’s still some barbs thrown at humankind as a whole, but it’s heartfelt. Oikawa sighs softly. “No, I’m to blame, too. There are a lot of customs here you’re not used to, and my first instinct is to get mad and lay down rules instead of sitting down and explaining them to you.”

Iwaizumi offers him a hand. Oikawa takes it, watching the fingers with their delicate nails elongate and grow into dark, grey-black claws that engulf Oikawa’s hand as Iwaizumi pulls him to his feet. This time when he smiles, it’s all fangs. “Did you see he look on her face when—”

“ _God_ , yes,” Oikawa groans again, the tail end fading into a laugh. “She was trying to figure out how to tell me off, but then you opened the door and she just—”

“I almost cried laughing, looking at the shock,” Iwaizumi laughs. “She totally went straight for the dick too, once she saw I wasn’t you. It was a fleeting moment, but she _totally_ —”

“I can’t even believe you,” Oikawa giggles. “That sassy pose. Are you literally trying to get a job in a gay porno? Because you’d be a _shoe-in_.”

“She totally thinks we’re fucking.”

“The ‘babe’ was a nice touch.”

“It was, wasn’t it?” Iwaizumi looks puffed up and proud, and Oikawa can only regard him with a kind of grudging fondness. Sometimes Iwaizumi could be a thoughtless jerk, but other times he was the kind of playful partner in crime Oikawa had always wished he had. Iwaizumi meets his gaze with uncharacteristic gentleness. Oikawa is suddenly very aware of the way Iwaizumi’s rough skin feels against his hand, the heat pouring off him, and slightly tugging grip, like Iwaizumi was subconsciously trying to pull Oikawa into his orbit…

_This is dangerous._ Oikawa snaps himself out of the strange haze he was in and gently removes his hand from Iwaizumi’s, shaking Iwaizumi out of his own trance. “Why were you even up this early?” Oikawa asks again.

“Ah.” Iwaizumi gestures at the kitchen. “I was, uh, going to make you breakfast as an olive branch before your…landlady? Before she showed up.”

“How sweet, Iwa-chan,” Oikawa laughs, the endearment slipping out before he can stop it. They both freeze.

“Iwa-chan?” Iwaizumi murmurs. Oikawa flushes.

“What? You get to call me ‘Tooru’ and ‘babe’ but I can’t call you Iwa-chan?” He refuses to meet Iwaizumi’s eyes, pouting and staring off to the side with his shoulders hunched.

“It’s _demeaning_ ,” Iwaizumi retorts.

“It’s _cute_ ,” Oikawa fires back.

They’re silent for a moment. “Let’s just…let’s just make you breakfast,” Iwaizumi concedes finally. Oikawa doesn’t protest that.

Actually, making breakfast with Iwaizumi has been his favorite part of this encounter so far. Oikawa’s the type to sing pop songs on the radio and dance around the kitchen, and Iwaizumi is a fan of sitting up on the counter, tail twitching to the beat and chewing on ice cubes. Their morning routine consists of Iwaizumi handing Oikawa pots, pans, or a rice cooker as he requires, usually by using his tail, while Oikawa prepares the food, swishing his hips and humming in time to whatever Iwaizumi changes the station to.

Sometimes, if it’s late enough in the morning and Iwaizumi is in a good mood, he’ll hop off the counter and dance with Oikawa: spinning him around in a circle or dipping him, bumping him with a hip or elbow at his side, hands on his hips from behind and mumbled lyrics in Oikawa’s ear, incorrect and ludicrous, making him laugh. Those days, the breakfast usually ends up overcooked, but Oikawa doesn’t mind; he’s happy enough to eat whatever he’s made while Iwaizumi sprawls across his bed belly-up, taking in the sunlight while they watch anime on television like kids with no cares in the world.

Iwaizumi occasionally helps cook, but he hardly ever eats. Oikawa knows the food isn’t _technically_ bad, and that since Iwaizumi is contained in a mostly human body, the food should agree with him, but Iwaizumi finds almost all of it unappealing. He likes the coffee and sugar well enough, but Oikawa knows a diet like that won’t sustain his human form, magic or not. Oikawa’s not sure if Iwaizumi can die of starvation, but he doesn’t want to be around if Iwaizumi starts to get desperate.

_After breakfast, then,_ Oikawa thinks. _After breakfast, I’ll see if I can’t figure out something to do._

It would probably be easiest just to _ask_ Iwaizumi what he needed to eat, but Iwaizumi got funny about those kinds of questions, the ones that implied he was weak or wasn’t adapting well to earth. Going up to him and telling him that we wasn’t taking very good care of his human body didn’t seem like a great idea to Oikawa. He would just have to do the research himself.

Oikawa is halfway through typing the query 'what to feed dragon demons' when it occurs to him that no one on the _planet_ knows what a dragon should eat, or even knows that they exist, and all he's going to get are results for fantasy roleplay sites for twelve-year-old boys who don't have any friends.

He really needs better friends.

Right now, the only people who could even _begin_ to understand what was going on were him, Iwaizumi, and fucking _Tobio-chan_. And like hell would Oikawa ever give Kageyama the satisfaction of saying he believed in magic. He was going to solve this demon problem all on his own and then spend the rest of his life pretending magic didn’t exist. (Only, that possibility seemed like another life in another dimension far, far away from Oikawa.)

“Ugggghhhh,” he moans, smacking his head on his laptop keyboard.

“What’s wrong?” Iwaizumi said, popping his head around the corner of the kitchen, a pair of sour straws in his mouth. He chews on the sour, sugary candies thoughtfully while Oikawa just stares between him and the computer screen.

“Don’t worry about it,” Oikawa sighs finally, miserably going back to tapping away at the computer. _Well, he seems to be doing alright now. Maybe magic maintains his health._

In a perfect world, that would be the last Oikawa ever thought about Iwaizumi’s diet. He seemed to be surviving well enough on candy and coffee, even if he did complain of stomachaches. But since Oikawa’s world seemed set out to damn him, the issue came to a head three days later.

A knock at the door, lighter than his landlady’s, draws Oikawa away from the coffeemaker. He trudges to the door, bleary-eyed, and yawns before opening it. “Yes?” He greets, hoping he sounds as tired as he feels and he’ll be left alone.

“Hey!” Oikawa blinks in surprise to see a guy he knew from one of his lecture halls. He had no idea the guy even knew where he lived.

“Watari,” Oikawa greets, confused. “What’s up?”

“Brought you some notes and assignments from class,” Watari says cheerfully, offering up the small collection of papers. “Figured that even if you were sick, you’d want to have the work at your fingertips.”

Oikawa could kiss him. “Oh my god, than—”

“ _Tooru_.” The growl cuts Oikawa off mid-word, and it’s all the warning he gets before Iwaizumi is _on him_ , draping his arms around Oikawa’s shoulders and burying his face in the back of Oikawa’s neck. He’s breathing heavily and labored, and while half of Oikawa is immediately concerned for his health, the other half is horrified that the use of his given name and the way Iwaizumi was touching him and breathing could be inferred that they were…Watari may or may not be breathing.

“That’s, uh, some really awesome make-up,” he offers awkwardly. Oikawa is confused for five long seconds before dread sinks in his gut and he looks down to see that Iwaizumi’s hands were not the nice, soft hands of a human, but the taloned and rough ones of a dragon.

“ _Iwaizumi_ ,” Oikawa hisses. “Go back to bed, you don’t look well.”

“ _Meat_ ,” he breathes into Oikawa’s ear. “I need meat.”

Watari is starting to look distinctly uncomfortable.

“I—I’m sorry, Watari, my cousin’s a little drunk right now,” Oikawa babbles. “Thank you so much for the notes, but I…um, I need to take care of him.”

“Yeah, sure,” Watari says distantly, looking at Iwaizumi’s horns with a hard-to-read expression. “I’ll see you in class.”

“See you,” Oikawa says quickly, shutting the door just as Iwaizumi starts to run his tongue over the skin at the base of Oikawa’s skull. Oikawa gasps raggedly, driving his elbows back into Iwaizumi to get him to release Oikawa, but he doesn’t budge. He braces Oikawa’s face with one clawed hand and runs the other down his back, heavy enough to send shivers down Oikawa’s spine and catch on his nightshirt.

“Iwa-chan, what the hell are you _doing_?” Oikawa asks, his voice strained, but Iwaizumi doesn’t reply, just growls contentedly and runs his fangs gently along Oikawa’s skin. The mark burns on Oikawa’s hand again.

“ _Stop!_ ” Oikawa cries, and the chain flares into view. He grabs a hold of it and tugs hard. Surprisingly, Iwaizumi actually pulls away at that, whining and scratching feebly at Oikawa. Oikawa spins around to see that he’s red-faced and panting, looking less like a predator and more like a starved dog.

“Please,” he whimpers. “This body is dying.”

_Holy shit_ , Oikawa thinks. _Holy shit, I was right. He really can’t survive on nothing._ “Why didn’t you eat anything?” He snaps. “You’re clearly malnourished!”

“Didn’t _know_ ,” he whines. “I need meat, please. Either that or your blood.”

“My _what_?” Oikawa screeches, hysterical. “You want to drink my _blood_? What are you, a vampire now?”

“There’s magic in you,” Iwaizumi explains, pained. “It could satiate me. I wouldn’t need that much, please.” He stumbles into Oikawa, wrapping his arms around Oikawa’s middle and mouthing at the bob of his Adam’s apple. Oikawa’s hand trembles on the chain, but his intuition is correct—Iwaizumi can’t break his skin without his permission.

He _can_ give Oikawa a fantastic hickey though, which is what he’s doing right now. He sucks at the skin, pulling Oikawa’s blood as close to his mouth as he can and it feels _good_ , but—Oikawa pushes him back. “Don’t—listen, we’ll go to the market right now, we’ll get you some meat, but you can’t have my blood, Jesus Christ.”

He shoves Iwaizumi back to their bedroom. “Put on a hoodie and sweatpants. Hide your horns in the hood and tail down your pants. Don’t argue with me; just do it,” he orders, getting stripped out of his boxers and shirt and into some real clothes himself.

They’re ready in record time. Oikawa has time to contemplate how completely unprepared he is to go out into the world with a poorly concealed demon, but he doesn’t really have a choice. There’s no way in hell he’s going to give Iwaizumi permission to harm him, even if would save his life. Oikawa opens the door to his apartment and crosses his fingers.

Oikawa tells Iwaizumi to stick close to him when they get out onto the main street, but there was no real need. Iwaizumi stuck uncomfortably close to him, breathing in his scent heavily. Oikawa doesn’t meet the eyes of anyone on the street, gritting his teeth and steadfastly refusing to imagine what this scene would look like to an outside observer. He hopes the beanie and sunglasses do a good job of hiding his identity, but he still feels like all the eyes of the public are on him and the dragon child practically clinging to his side.

Thankfully, this early in the morning only a few older patrons of the grocery mart are browsing for food. Oikawa is completely alone in the refrigerated section. “Okay,” he hisses at Iwaizumi. “Pick whatever you want, and make it quick.”

Iwaizumi scents the air, mouth open, and wrinkles his nose in disgust. “It’s all old,” he replies. “There’s nothing fresh here at all.”

“Welcome to earth,” Oikawa grumbles. “Pick something or die.”

Moodily, Iwaizumi finally settles on what might possibly be the bloodiest steak chunk Oikawa has ever seen in his life. He makes a face but takes the meat from Iwaizumi and wanders back to the register. It’s expensive, and Oikawa shoots a glare at Iwaizumi, but the demon is looking so worn down Oikawa can’t muster up the energy to be mad at him. Oikawa leads him out of the store and up the road, into the patch of forest that lies at the edge of the city.

He pulls the meat out of the grocery bag and hands it to Iwaizumi who practically snatches it from him. Iwaizumi tears into the packaging with a snarl and pulls out the steak, digging his terrifying teeth into it and ripping at it, dropping to a crouch to eat the meat, making rumbling growls as he eats with a fervor that frightens Oikawa a little. It’s one thing to see those teeth bared at him and another altogether to see them in action, tearing at the steak like it was bread.

He’s bloody-mouthed and wild-eyed by the time he’s done with the meat, looking up at Oikawa expectantly, as if he had more in the bag. Oikawa feels a slash of fear in his heart, but before he can say or do anything, Iwaizumi’s head whips to the side and he does the weird mouth-scenting thing again, hunching over a moment later like he was going to pounce. Oikawa tries to follow his line of sight, but doesn’t see anything except the darkness of the forest in the pre-dawn light.

Iwaizumi launches himself into the underbrush so quickly Oikawa hardly has time to yelp. He disappears from sight easily with his dark clothes and Oikawa is left alone in the forest with only the sounds of rustling where Iwaizumi took off and the occasional low growl. He freezes still with fear as the rustling and growling grow in intensity, then nothing. Oikawa is afraid to breathe too heavily, a tiny cloud of condensation moving past shaking lips. A pair of yellow slits meet his eyes and he freaks out.

“Jesus, Iwa-chan!” He exclaims. “Give a guy a little warning, would you? You’re terrifying.”

Iwaizumi stands up and steps into the light, grinning. There’s a skip in his step, but Oikawa can tell something is off. There’s blood on his chin and in his teeth. “Iwa-chan?” Oikawa asks softly.

Iwaizumi holds up the carcass of a rabbit, a chunk clearly removed from it. Oikawa nearly hurls. “I found something live!” Iwaizumi says cheerfully. “Much better than some stinking old shit.”

Oikawa makes a pained noise. “That’s…great…Iwa-chan. Can you not eat it in front of me though?”

Iwaizumi shrugs. “Yeah, sure. You go back to the apartment and I’ll catch up with you. I kind of want to hunt a little longer anyway.” Oikawa shudders.

“That’s fine,” he concedes. “Just make sure no humans see you. They’ll definitely lose it.”

Iwaizumi rolls his shoulders. “No problem.”

 

\---------------------------------------

 

When Iwaizumi gets back, animal all over his borrowed clothes and grinning like a loon, Oikawa decides it’s high time they bought Iwaizumi some clothes of his own.

“What? No. Ew,” Iwaizumi protests immediately. “Why?”

Oikawa gestures at his laptop, then at his ruined clothes. “Obviously, we are not coming to any conclusion about how to get rid of you very quickly. I have to go back to university next week, and I can’t afford to have you lurking around my apartment, bored. You need to be out and doing stuff and helping buy groceries—stuff like that.”

Iwaizumi looks baffled by all of this. “Yeah, okay. What does that have to do with clothes?”

Oikawa wants to scream. “You look like a serial killer! There’s blood everywhere! Ruin your own damn clothes, not mine.”

He doesn’t like it very much, but in the end, Oikawa’s logic wins out and Iwaizumi finds himself being dragged out the door and down the street _again_ , this time in the middle of the city with the noise and smell and movement of thousands of humans around them. He’s fascinated by their variety—from the kids on skateboards to the businesswomen speaking in a different language into their Bluetooth—that he forgets to be annoyed at buying clothes.

Oikawa thanks every god he can think of once they get in the store that he actually has a sense of fashion and size, because the look Iwaizumi gives him is one that screams ‘like _hell_ I’m going to try any of this on.’ Iwaizumi might be shorter than Oikawa, but he was far more muscular. Even now, the way he crossed his arms in a pout demonstrated how Oikawa’s shirts had to stretch to accommodate his biceps. Oikawa snickers into his hand. Iwaizumi glares at him. “What is it, Tooru?” He growls.

“Oh nothing, nothing,” Oikawa chirps in a sing-song voice. “I just didn’t know I had free tickets to Iwa-chan’s gunshow.”

“Here’s the close-up of me using those guns on your _face_ ,” Iwaizumi snaps, grabbing at Oikawa, who squeals and runs away, giggling.

Iwaizumi doesn’t have fun after that. He _doesn’t_. It’s not fun to have Oikawa point out My Little Pony shirts in the girl’s department and apologize that they don’t have any in Iwaizumi’s size. It’s not fun to try on different pairs of sunglasses while Oikawa invents personas for each pair’s owner and acts them out. It’s not fun to watch Oikawa hum thoughtfully and compare clothes and styles to Iwaizumi, a hobby he clearly enjoys. It’s definitely not fun to have Oikawa loop a scarf around his neck and pull him in close, eyelashes fluttering probably without his knowledge, hearing his breathy laugh in close proximity before being spun away.

“I hate shopping,” Iwaizumi says with feeling after two hours of torture.

“Lucky for you, I don’t,” Oikawa replies, moving up in line and dumping all of Iwaizumi’s clothes on the counter. The clerk keeps giving Iwaizumi these _looks_ , and Oikawa can’t tell if it’s that he looks like a criminal waiting to rob the store or that he looks like a model incognito in ill-fitting clothing.

“That’s um, a nice tattoo,” the clerk says while ringing up the clothes, and Oikawa remembers that right, the sigil is in a very obvious and theoretically painful place.

“Say thank you, Iwa-chan, don’t be rude,” Oikawa tuts, handing over his credit card.

“O-Oh,” the clerk says, and right, Oikawa had that exact same sigil on his hand. He flushes for a moment, not really sure what the clerk thinks is going on between them, but he only offers a small smile and glances between them. “It’s cute,” he assures Oikawa.

“There’s nothing cute at all about Tooru,” Iwaizumi grumbles, taking the bags.

But the clerk is just smiling with this secretive, knowing look in his eyes, and Oikawa feels his stomach drop. _Oh no,_ he thinks. _My apartment building, my school, and now the department store…who else will know about Iwa-chan and I?_ The thought of having to come up with some lie about where Iwaizumi left to after they figured out how to dissolve the bond was a nightmare.

Iwaizumi catches him by the elbow and tugs him away from the counter. “C’mon,” he says, as if sensing Oikawa’s despair. “Let’s go home.”

_This was just great._

Oikawa leans back in his desk chair, long after they’d returned home and he had dived back into research. On his bed, Iwaizumi flips through a new book, engrossed in the plot. Oikawa tilts his head back to look at Iwaizumi upside down. What he had said about Iwaizumi getting bored…that had been a load of shit, honestly. Iwaizumi was the easiest person to entertain in this world and probably his own, too.

Iwaizumi was fascinated with books. It didn’t really matter what they were about—he didn’t appear to have any preference where genre was concerned, reading everything from Oikawa’s college student cookbook to his conspiracy theory magazines. There was never any judgment on Iwaizumi’s part, surprisingly. Oikawa doesn’t know if he’s annoyed or relieved that Iwaizumi loves reading too much to tease him.

He looks somewhat elegant when he reads, curled up in a chair or sprawled across the bed, eyes darting across the page and completely still except for the twitch of his tail when he gets to a tense or exciting part. Iwaizumi has proved time and time again that he’s capable of being delicate with his claws, but especially when turning the pages of a book, Iwaizumi takes great care not to tear or crumple any of the pages. His love for books is borderline reverence, but when Oikawa asks him about it, all Iwaizumi says is that it’s his favorite pastime back home.

The novel he’s reading now is one of Oikawa’s favorites. It’s about an FBI agent in charge of guarding a facility where the government experiments on alien life, but ends up seeing the horrors committed against the sentient alien species when a young woman breaks in to investigate. Together, they break the law and try to conceal the last surviving member of the alien race by smuggling it to another country, but it’s a gripping and suspenseful novel that ultimately ends in the protagonist’s sacrifice to save the woman he falls in love with and the alien who had become a friend.

Oikawa decides it’s too good a tale to spoil the ending for Iwaizumi, even if it would pull him out of his trance. Instead, Oikawa asks what’s been on his mind since he wrapped his head around the fact that magic was a thing. “Are aliens real?”

Iwaizumi looks up from his book. He examines the way Oikawa is leaning back in his chair, acting silly and casual, but he also notices the way Oikawa’s leg is jiggling up and down impatiently. “This is important to you,” he surmises.

Oikawa shrugs. “I guess.”

“You won’t like the answer,” Iwaizumi replies, putting the book down.

Oikawa exhales. “I just…need to know.”

“…Yes, probably,” Iwaizumi says. “But not little green men from space or some kind of primordial bacteria on a distant moon, not that I know of. But what humans call ‘aliens’ are probably just demons or other supernatural creatures that have done a poor job disguising themselves.”

Oikawa wrinkles his nose. “You’re right; I don’t like the answer. What about flying saucers and all that kind of stuff? Humans have gotten weird grainy pictures for decades.”

Iwaizumi shrugs. “Hell if I know. I haven’t ever been on earth. But if there were aliens from another planet, our kind or the Hunters would have run them off by now.”

“Hunters?” Oikawa asks, tilting his head. Iwaizumi’s expression darkens.

“Nothing,” he snaps. “Don’t worry about it.”

Oikawa frowns, sits up, and spins around in his chair. He glares hard at Iwaizumi, who returns it just as strongly. “Who are the Hunters, Iwa-chan?”

“None of your fucking business,” he growls, but then, in a softer voice, adds, “The less you know, the better off you’ll be when I’m gone.”

_When I’m gone_. Oikawa nearly starts at that. It was weird to think he’d soon have his apartment to himself again. As much as it was too cluttered a space for two people, imagining it with just one person seemed too empty.

“Let’s go to the bookstore,” Oikawa suggests suddenly. “There’s an antique and used one—Chamblin’s Book Mine—not too far into town. You’ll have to wear clothes, but…” He gestures at his laptop. “Honestly, I don’t think we’ll be finding our answer on the web.”

“Book Mine?” Iwaizumi asks, intrigued.

Oikawa smiles. “You’ll understand when we get there.”

 

\------------------------------------------

 

Chamblin’s took the saying ‘never judge a book by its cover’ a little too seriously, in Oikawa’s opinion. The outside of the store was an absolute dump—peeling paint and graffiti, weeds growing through cracks in the sidewalk and a few brave lines of ivy climbing the windowless walls, and a roof in sore need of replacement or renovation. Iwaizumi looks just as skeptical as Oikawa had been when he first visited the store, squinting at the address on a piece of paper in confusion.

But, Oikawa thought, it would all be worth the look on Iwaizumi’s face when they stepped inside. And as he had hoped, when they walk through door, Iwaizumi’s jaw drops.

A ‘book mine’ didn’t just mean a bookstore—it meant a literal haven for books, stacked floor to ceiling in long stretching bookcases that wrapped around the oddly shaped store like the labyrinth of bibliophiles, trapping the patrons willingly for hours on end. The back of the store was invisible under the sheer volume of books, and the illusion it gave off was one that made the store seem to go on forever. Peeling neon signs taped up to shelves told customers in black sharpie where the different genres of books could be found, a veritable twist and tangle of arrows and inefficient organization that made Oikawa want to melt at the genuine nature of the store.

“Tooru,” Iwaizumi whispers, tugging on Oikawa’s shirt, eyes wide. “I never want to leave earth again.”

Oikawa laughs, loud and clear enough to draw the attention of one of the employees, whose eyes light up in recognition. “Tooru-chan!” She calls, waving him over. “Looking for some new conspiracy theories? We got a few new books and a documentary a week back! I put them aside for you.”

“Ana-chan,” Oikawa greets, just as pleasantly, walking over to her. “Ah, I’m afraid we’re here for something a little different this time.” He winks at her and Iwaizumi snorts.

“Ooo, who’s this?” Ana coos excitedly, holding out a hand to Iwaizumi. “I’m Takagi Ana, nice to meet you! But you can just call me Ana-chan!”

“Iwaizumi,” Iwaizumi offers gruffly, but smiles a little at her energy. “I hope you can help us out.”

“Right!” She says, clapping her hands together. “Lay it on me, Tooru-chan, what do you need?”

Oikawa wiggles his eyebrows. “We’re on the lookout for some books on witchcraft, if you’ve got them. The older and more antique-looking, the better.”

She laughs. “You’re into some weird shit, Tooru-chan. Luckily, you’re so darn cute I can’t help but give you a hand. Follow me.”

She leads them down the aisles, weaving around twists and turns expertly, dragging them deeper and deeper into the bowels of the shop. Oikawa seems perfectly at ease, but Iwaizumi feels a mixture of fear and awe at the sheer number of books they stock and the fact that he could theoretically get very lost down here. Still, he reaches out a hand to run fingers lovingly along the spines of the books they pass, some good as new and others shoving the wear that comes with a well-loved book.

“Here!” Ana announces, pointing them down a small aisle off the ‘main’ pathway. “There’s not all that much, but then again, it’s not every day people come looking for stuff on witchcraft. Good luck you two!” She skips off after blowing them both kisses.

“She’s…a character,” Iwaizumi concludes.

“Ana-chan gets me all the best works on extraterrestrial life,” Oikawa explains, turning his attention back to the shelves. “We went to the same elementary school and our parents used to be good friends. She’s very reliable.”

“You think she’ll be able to help us find a book on familiar spells?” Iwaizumi asks.

Oikawa shrugs and plasters on a hopeful smile, but he knows the score. The grimoire that had gotten him in trouble the first time didn’t have anything on reversing spells, only performing them—at least where familiars were concerned. Oikawa remembers clearly the feeling of power and heaviness that was more than just weight like it was yesterday; if that thing didn’t have a solution, he doubted any book would. Still, it was worth a try.

He decides to focus on that feeling of power rather than skimming the books for contents. Oikawa runs his hands along the books, waiting for one to call out to him. A few times he thinks he might have found it, but upon closer examination there’s nothing that can help them out written in its pages. He lets out a long sigh of frustration, but there’s really nothing to be done about it. Oikawa glances over at Iwaizumi, wondering if he’s found anything when he’s been so quiet, but can only huff and smile fondly at what he sees.

Iwaizumi has about ten books wrapped protectively in his arms while furiously reading an eleventh one, and he’s only about two steps down the aisle. He devours the contents of the book with a vigor that reminds Oikawa of himself as a child, flopping into the big armchair and refusing to leave, even for lunch. The innocent and honest desire for knowledge makes Oikawa’s chest ache for a moment, and then he thinks quite clearly that despite it all, he’s going to miss Iwaizumi.

“Come on,” Oikawa says gently. “We’re not going to find our answer here.”

Iwaizumi looks up, baffled. “So that’s it? You’re just giving up?”

Oikawa grits his teeth. “No,” he sighs, defeated. “We’re going to see Tobio-chan."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "um ryan so i found this one detail that's inconsistent with the second chapter" shhhhhh small, detail-oriented friend, it's aaaalllllll for a reason


	4. The Case of Kageyama Tobio I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i feel bad that i haven't updated this when i said i wouldn't abandon it;; anyway, i read through, and the writing/pacing isn't bad enough for me to rewrite, so i'm just going to carry on! thank you everyone who stuck with me, and to new readers, hello!!

 

“No,” Kageyama says, and shuts the door in their faces.

“Fat lot of help that was,” Iwaizumi says, picking at his teeth with a claw.

Beside him, Oikawa whines and hops up and down in place. “Tobio- _chan_ , please!” He knocks insistently on the door until his knuckles turn red and sore. Oikawa pulls his hand away, pouts, and then proceeds to bang his forehead against the door. “Tobio! Tobio! Tobio!”

He nearly crashes into Kageyama when Kageyama whips the door open, a look of ferocity in his eyes so wild, it makes Iwaizumi raise an eyebrow. “Good demon material, this one,” Iwaizumi mutters under his breath.

“Shut your mouth, Oikawa-san!” Kageyama snaps. “You’re going to disturb my neighbors, and then they’ll complain to the homeowner and get me in trouble.”

Oikawa’s eyes twinkle. “Well, if you’d just _let us in_ , we wouldn’t have to pitch a fit now, would we?”

Tobio opens his mouth to protest, but pauses. “We?”

“Sorry for the intrusion,” Iwaizumi growls and steps around Oikawa, shoving one hand against his face and the other against Kageyama’s door. Oikawa squawks in indignation, missing the exchange of glances between Kageyama and Iwaizumi. Kageyama’s eyes flick from the all-consuming black of Iwaizumi’s eyes to the yellow-green slits of pupils, to the clawed hand pressed against his door. Iwaizumi shoulders past him.

“Iwa-chan is so _rude_!” Oikawa huffs, straightening out his coat and hair. “Doesn’t know a thing about manners.”

“Oikawa-san,” Kageyama says calmly, “your friend isn’t human.”

“Well of course he’s not,” Oikawa sighs, exasperated, as if Kageyama was being painfully slow for not noticing immediately. “Would I have come to you for boy problems if he was a _normal_ boy? No, I don’t think so.” It’s Oikawa’s turn to step past a gaping Kageyama, who realizes he’s falling behind and rushes to Oikawa’s side, yanking him back with a sharp tug to the shoulder.

“You don’t _believe_ in the supernatural,” Kageyama insists. “Only weeks ago, you told me—”

“Yeah, yeah,” Oikawa grumbles, refusing to make eye contact. “Don’t rub it in. We’ll explain everything over tea.”

Kageyama raises an eyebrow, but dutifully makes for the kitchen to prepare tea for his uninvited guests. Oikawa slouches into the main room and drops next to Iwaizumi in front of the kotatsu. It’s not even that cold out, but Oikawa wiggles his feet under the table, savoring the heat and slumping against its surface.

“Don’ wanna tell Tobio-chan,” he gripes.

“I don’t see how that’s my problem,” Iwaizumi says, not taking his eyes off of the book he had snagged from the tabletop—one of Kageyama’s textbooks by the look of it. “You were the one who started this whole mess.”

“Actually, it’s because Tobio-chan dropped the science honor society,” Oikawa argues under his breath.

“Still your fault,” Iwaizumi contests.

“Tea’s here,” Kageyama breaks in setting the teapot and cups on top of the kotatsu. His eyes flick to Iwaizumi uneasily, and he sits across the table from him. “Who’re you?” he asks.

“Iwaizumi,” Iwaizumi replies. He pours himself a cup carefully, the pot and cup looking tiny and fragile in his talons.

Kageyama raises an eyebrow. “Just Iwaizumi?”

“Just Iwaizumi,” Iwaizumi says.

“He’s a demon,” Oikawa adds helpfully. He sips at his own cup.

Kageyama takes a moment to digest this, eyes growing progressively wider. “So…how did you two…meet?”

“Well,” Oikawa begins. “It all started when I stole your big magic book—”

“ _You_ stole my book?! …Excuse me, Iwaizumi-san. Oikawa-san, it’s time to die.”

“Tobio-chan, _no_!”

 

\--------------------------------------

 

It takes two pots of tea and Iwaizumi intervening on behalf of Oikawa’s life before the entire story is out. Kageyama’s face is cast in deep, anxious thought. Iwaizumi lounges like a king, having slid progressively farther and farther under the kotatsu. Oikawa yawns.

“You’re a fucking idiot,” Kageyama says.

Iwaizumi’s cackle drowns out Oikawa’s noise of protest. Iwaizumi clutches his stomach and sucks in wheezing breaths. “Jesus, kid,” he says. “You hit the nail on the head.”

“Honestly, what did you expect to happen when you came to me?” Kageyama addresses Oikawa. “Did you expect me to be able to ‘magic away’ Iwaizumi-san and all your problems? I’m an absolute amateur!”

“Well, I—” Oikawa sputters.

Kageyama groans and places a hand to his forehead. “I’m sure Iwaizumi-san has made this clear, but…the fact that you’re alive is a miracle. That summoning should have killed you, if Iwaizumi-san didn’t himself.” Kageyama side eyes Iwaizumi. His brows pull together and he quirks one side of his mouth, as if he was short a piece in a puzzle and looking for that missing piece in Iwaizumi. “He’s powerful,” Kageyama observes.

“He’s an Archdemon,” Oikawa says, but that’s not what Kageyama meant. Iwaizumi understands.

“I need gyouza,” Kageyama sighs. “I’ll make a plate of them.”

He walks back into the kitchen, rubbing his neck. All of his body aches from listening to Oikawa’s story in the same position, hunched over the kotatsu, like he might leap across it at any time. And Iwaizumi…he had been sizing Kageyama up. Kageyama knows it in the hairs rising along his skin, the prickling across the back of his neck. Iwaizumi is dangerous.

But even more so than the feeling of his power, what really throws Kageyama off is the amount of control Iwaizumi has his power under. Kageyama is only a novice at sensing magic, but there is no way he could miss the magic rolling off Iwaizumi’s body despite the lid Iwaizumi attempts to keep closed tight on it. Iwaizumi is more than powerful. An Archdemon? Maybe. But Kageyama isn’t so sure. Iwaizumi—

“ _Fuck!_ ” Kageyama swears and drops the plate he was holding. Iwaizumi snatches it from its trajectory with reflexes Kageyama has difficulty tracking. “Iwaizumi-san,” he says, once he gets his breath back. “You scared me.”

“My apologies,” Iwaizumi says, returning the plate to Kageyama’s hands. “Need any help?”

“Uh, no, I should be fine on my own,” Kageyama says.

“Good,” Iwaizumi says, hopping up onto the counter instead and staring down Kageyama in the darkness of the kitchen. “I want to talk to you.”

“Oh? About what?” Kageyama fakes ignorance, but his voice shakes.

“You’re a talented magician, given how young you are,” Iwaizumi says. “Your senses are strong and you have a good natural instinct and affinity for magic.”

“Thank you?” Kageyama says uncertainly.

“Unfortunately, that means you poke your nose where it doesn’t belong,” Iwaizumi continues. “This doesn’t concern you, no matter how much Oikawa thinks it does.”

“Are…are you threatening me?” Kageyama whispers.

Iwaizumi’s tail slaps against the counter. “I don’t want to. I would much rather ask you trust me and don’t go digging too far into this situation.”

“Trust you?” Kageyama scoffs. “You’re a demon, very unhappy about being trapped on earth, and as a familiar no less. You’re tied to my senpai, who somehow was able to summon an unusually powerful demon through normal familiar summoning with no training. Excuse me if I don’t trust you with the safety of my friend.”

“You think I don’t know it’s weird?” Iwaizumi snaps, tail slapping against the counter again, harder this time. “You think _I_ understand it? I don’t at all. I’m not going to endanger or kill Tooru before I know what he’s capable of, or how it might affect me. That’s not what I’m asking.”

“Oh? So what are you asking?” Kageyama crosses his arms.

“For your own safety,” Iwaizumi says. “For the safety of Tooru, for the safety of anyone you care about, _don’t_ pry into my history or identity. Please.”

“You’re hiding something,” Kageyama says.

Iwaizumi quirks an eyebrow. “Aren’t we all?” Kageyama has to look away at that.

“Fine, but you have to let me help you both,” Kageyama insists. “You’re getting nowhere, and I have connections. Also, I still don’t trust you.”

“Fair enough,” Iwaizumi agrees.

“Tobio-chan, Iwa-chan,” Oikawa calls. “I’m hungry.”

“I’ll take care of the toddler,” Iwaizumi says, and leaves Kageyama to the cooking. If Kageyama’s fingers tremble a little when he brings out the gyouza, no one says anything about it.

“So, Tobio-chan is an actual wizard and not a faker, huh?” Oikawa puts his chin in his hands.

“A _magician_ ,” Kageyama corrects. “And not a very good one yet. I’ve mastered basic spells for the four elements and I’m trying out simple telekinetic and healing spells. I can only really push things and heal scratches now, though.”

“Oooo, the four elements,” Oikawa says, wiggling his eyebrows now. “There can’t be all that much to learn if you’ve got those down.”

“Not true,” Iwaizumi interrupts. “There are seven elements, those are just the four mortal elements. There’s also light, which is associated with angelic beings, and darkness, which is associated with demonic beings.”

“I want to meet an angel one day,” Kageyama says, wistful.

“No you don’t,” Iwaizumi says. “They are…some of the only things I would really call monsters. They will do whatever they have to in order to achieve justice. There’s no grey area with them, just good or evil.”

“I know,” Kageyama says. “But to be in the presence of overwhelming fear and awe—I want to know it, just once.”

“I guess angels would have to be real if demons are real,” Oikawa says. “But does that mean everything else is, too? Werewolves and vampires and the undead and ghosts and dragons—ah, well, Iwa-chan is a dragon, so I guess I already knew that one.”

“That’s pretty much right, yeah,” Kageyama says. “But it’s not at all like you’d imagine.” He cocks his head to the side. “Did you say Iwaizumi-san is…a dragon?”

“My form is draconic in nature,” Iwaizumi says tightly. “Lord knows how many times I’ve been mistaken for one of _those_.”

“Interesting,” Kageyama murmurs.

“Wait, wait—before, Iwa-chan, you only named six out of seven elements. What’s the last one?” Oikawa asks.

“No one knows,” Iwaizumi replies. “Stardust? Life? Death? Void? Not even I could tell you.”

Oikawa turns to Kageyama, but he shakes his head. “He’s right. We don’t know _what_ it is, only that it is the most powerful force in this universe. Some magicians think it might even be magic itself.”

“This _sucks_ ,” Oikawa says. “Even the experts don’t know everything about magic. I want to go home and sleep. Maybe forever.” He pauses. “We haven’t even talked about how we’re going to get rid of Iwa-chan!”

Kageyama stands, collecting the plates and cups. “We can’t do anything tonight,” he says. “I’ll use my resources within the Lightwood Society to see if I can find out anything about breaking a familiar contract. There has to be something.” He holds up a finger. “But I want something in return.”

“Great,” Oikawa deadpans.

Kageyama turns to Iwaizumi and bows, low and awkward. “Iwaizumi-san…please help me with my magical exams.”

“Eh?” Iwaizumi blinks. “Can I even help you?”

“You’re a skilled magic user; please take me on as an apprentice of sorts while you’re here,” Kageyama asks.

Iwaizumi grumbles. “Fine, fine. I’ll do what I can. You’re not incompetent, so it might actually be enjoyable.”

“And next time, don’t come by my house unexpectedly!” Kageyama growls. “My parents could have been visiting!”

 

\-------------------------------------------

 

They come by unexpectedly again.

Kageyama doesn’t even say anything, just pinches the bridge of his nose and sighs. Oikawa skips by him, thrilled to finally be making progress on the familiar situation, up until the point Kageyama directs him to the pile of dusty tomes that are his reading material for the day. Iwaizumi on the other hand, gets to go outside with Kageyama in his small backyard, and practice earth spells.

Oikawa spends ten minutes cooped up inside before he comes to his senses and drags the stack of books outside. From the relative comfort of Kageyama’s camp chair, Oikawa can glance up every now and then from his combing to watch his companions at work.

The dichotomy is amusing. Iwaizumi’s gifts are overwhelmingly superior to Kageyama’s, even given his natural talent. A single beckon of his claw draws roots out of the ground, climbing and twining around each other face the palm of Iwaizumi’s hand. Pink flowers and green shoots dot the roots as they change into curling branches at will.

Kageyama, on the other hand, has a black marker out, scribbling swirled, organic designs amongst sharp, geometric lines to form a sigil for plants summoning. He must speak the spell aloud in accented Latin. The words fall from his tongue heavy and awkward. It takes him seven tries before he can even call a weed to sprout.

Even so, Oikawa is impressed. If he thinks back to a month ago, he would not have believed his own eyes. The fact that a human could command the earth to produce a living, photosynthesizing, metabolizing _thing_ was incredible. Unbelievable. For a scientist like Oikawa, the process is what interests him the most. How does the shape of the design affect its power? How far can it be off? What is the interconnectedness of the spoken spell? And why doesn’t Iwaizumi need either?

“How’s the reading coming?” Iwaizumi calls.

Oikawa’s eyes drop guiltily to the abandoned book. “It’s in English,” he says. “It’s a pain in the ass to translate. Slow going, alright?”

“You know, if you want to join us, you can just ask,” Iwaizumi says, shaping the branches to form a twisted hand embracing his own.

Oikawa feels as if he has been slapped in the face. “No thanks,” he mutters, and sticks his nose back in the book. He only looks up once more when Kageyama yelps. (Iwaizumi had commanded roots to loop around Kageyama’s ankles and trap him in place.)

Kageyama’s rental house became a second home to them. The place was far more spacious than Oikawa’s apartment, given the Lightwood Society provided decent, private accommodation for all of their magicians. Kageyama’s only stipulation was that they didn’t stay overnight. (He glanced at Iwaizumi when he said that, Oikawa caught it.)

After university work, the three grouped up to work on magic. Mondays were for air and internet research; Tuesdays for fire and Oikawa’s self-care; Wednesdays for water and cooking; Thursdays for earth and Fridays for an intro into the other elements while Oikawa did book research. They had learned after a few close calls not to bring the books out on fire or water days.

Strangely enough, it was…hard…for Oikawa to stay back and watch Iwaizumi and Kageyama practice magic. Against his better judgement, he was getting drawn in to the fantastic language of magic, words and images that could control the world. He told himself it was just scientific curiosity, but it was difficult to convince himself when he mouthed the words along with Kageyama and painted sigils in the air as he waited for the tea to boil.

He almost asked them, a few times. In all likelihood, they would accept him wholeheartedly—Kageyama, having slowly opened up to Iwaizumi, returned to his magic geek self, talking non-stop about different spells and tripping over his words. And Iwaizumi—well, Iwaizumi had offered in the first place. Half of Oikawa was dying to try it out, and a very small part of him wondered if he might be amazing at it if he tried, given his success with summoning. But the other half of him bucked at the idea. Magic reeked of danger and risk. Oikawa wouldn’t put his life at risk for curiosity.

Perhaps their lives might have remained in limbo in Kageyama’s backyard like that, hurling fireballs and making tiny rain clouds from their breaths while Oikawa watched in longing, if it weren’t for Iwaizumi’s perceptiveness.

Kageyama let down his guard around Iwaizumi, as was to be expected for a human when their expectations were turned on their head. Iwaizumi was nothing if not a patient teacher, and treated both of his human companions with respect. He appeared content and at ease.

Nothing could be farther from the truth.

“Tobio, when are your intermediate exams?” he asks on a Tuesday. Fire day. They’re roasting skewers of meat and vegetables in their hands today, mostly because he and Oikawa skipped lunch. Iwaizumi has no problem holding a steady flame in his hands, but Kageyama’s flickers and sways.

“Midterms are in a couple months,” Kageyama grunts, sweat dripping down his temple. “Have to show significant progress, or I won’t be considered to take the intermediate exam.”

Iwaizumi hums thoughtfully. “You should be far ahead of schedule with this grueling training I’ve put you through.”

“I hope so, too,” Kageyama says. He hisses in pain and the fire flickers out. Iwaizumi eyes his palms. They’re unnaturally red. “I’m going to run these under some cold water,” Kageyama says. “Eat without me.”

Iwaizumi grunts an assent and tears off a piece of meat. He hands Oikawa his, too, much to his summoner’s pleasure. He doesn’t pay attention to Oikawa though; his eyes follow Kageyama, and he chews slowly.

“Forgot something inside,” he says to Oikawa, who isn’t even paying attention.

Iwaizumi trails Kageyama inside, footsteps silent and blending with the shadows. He’s careful not to disguise himself with too much magic—Kageyama is even more sensitive than before. Around the corner in the kitchen, Kageyama slides his hands under the cool tap water, as he had said he would. He grits his teeth at the burn before sighing in relief. Iwaizumi can see him mouthing the words to the spell they had just been practicing. For the first time, Iwaizumi doubts his instincts.

But then Kageyama turns off the water and his face hardens.

He grips the counter, hunching his shoulders. He doesn’t even flinch when his raw hands clench at the linoleum. The mouthing of the spell turns into whispering, ragged at first, but getting stronger and smoother the more he lets the Latin roll off his tongue. Finally, he relaxes and reaches for the bottom drawer of the kitchen cabinet, pulling it open and tugging out a book. Kageyama whips his head around, scanning the room uneasily. Iwaizumi barely manages to duck behind the corner and avoid Kageyama’s scrutiny.

When he peeks back around, he recognizes the book as a magician’s spell book not from the look of it, but from the smell of it. It smells sharp and spicy, the wild energy of magic carved into its pages, but it also smells like Kageyama, the delicate scent of the magician keeping an untrained but firm grasp on the words and sigils that threatened to leap from the page and come to life. The book itself is moleskin and bound with silvery clasps in the shape of wings. Iwaizumi swears to himself. Blessed steel. _Curse Kageyama’s infatuation with angels, now there was no way he’d be able to peek inside._

Kageyama scribbles down the sigil from their lesson and some notes in the margins. Iwaizumi leans in closer. There’s no shame in recording spells, so what is with all the secrecy? Then Kageyama starts to flip pages and Iwaizumi’s hackles rise. He can only catch glimpses, but amongst the spells Iwaizumi has taught him, there are other much more complex, ancient spells, ones even Iwaizumi isn’t familiar with.

“Forgive me, Oikawa-san, Iwaizumi-san,” Kageyama whispers. “May the Lightwood Society have mercy on us all.”

Iwaizumi’s seen enough. He slinks away, picking up his pace the further he gets from Kageyama. He shakes his head, blood boiling. It must show on his face because Oikawa’s expression falls and he nearly drops his skewer.

“Iwa-chan? Is something the matter?” he asks.

Iwaizumi takes hold of his upper arm and pulls him away from the backyard, away from their beers, _away_. “We’re leaving,” he says, leaving no room for argument.

“But Tobio—”

“We’re _leaving_.”

 

\--------------------------------

 

Oikawa pulls off his glasses to rub at his eyes, brows pinched together. He slides his glasses back on and turns in his chair to look at Iwaizumi, perched on the windowsill in an uncomfortable crouch, muscles coiled and ready to spring, eyes scanning their surroundings. “So,” Oikawa starts. “Are you ever going to tell me what’s going on?” No reply.

Oikawa stands, pushing away from his chair. “Because I just got finished texting a very distraught Tobio-chan who thought something had happened to us given that we _disappeared_ without any notice. He was worried, Iwa-chan, doesn’t that mean anything to you?” Still nothing.

He huffs. “Guess you really are just a heartless demon after all,” he says.

Iwaizumi doesn’t move, but this time he does respond. “Your petty insults won’t sway my decision. My first and only priority is to ensure both of our safety until we can remove the familiar bond.”

“Well, that’s a relief,” Oikawa says, icy. “Considering how rude you were to the only person who could help us, I thought for a second maybe you were trying to sabotage our plans to reverse the spell.”

Iwaizumi turns to him. “Did you consider, even for a moment, why Kageyama is so valuable to us as a resource?”

“Obviously because he has ties to that magic society of his,” Oikawa scoffs. “I’m not stupid.”

“And did you consider the illegalityof the spell you performed, who would come after us because you broke a law, and who could potentially benefit by giving said persons information about us, our location, and our abilities?” he asks.

“…Oh,” Oikawa says softy.

“That’s right, ‘oh,’” Iwaizumi says, shifting his gaze outside once more. “I’m going to act as sentry until we can confront him about it tomorrow.”

“But how do you know Tobio-cha would tattle on us?” Oikawa asks. “It’s not like him to do something like that.”

“I gave him the benefit of the doubt to start,” Iwaizumi explains. “But today I saw him very surreptitiously pulling out a spell book and writing in it like it was top secret. It’s sealed with blessed steel, so a demon could never open it, and within the paged were both spells I taught him and other wildly complex spells that not even I recognized.” 

Oikawa covers his mouth. “So you think Tobio is…lying about his skill level? That he’s really reporting on our abilities to the Lightwood Society?”

“Something like that,” Iwaizumi says. “I like the thought as much as you do, especially since he’s so genuinely interested and in love with magic, but I don’t see another forthcoming explanation.” To himself, he mutters, “Should’ve never screwed with an angel sympathizer.”

“What do we do now?” Oikawa asks. He climbs onto his bed and scoots close to Iwaizumi, enough to lean his head against Iwaizumi’s side. His mouth curls into a tiny frown. “I don’t want to lose Tobio-chan.”

“We just need to find out what he’s told them,” Iwaizumi says. “I may have to wipe his mind, at least of memories of us. We’ll probably have to move, too. If they send Hunters…”

“Hunters again,” Oikawa murmurs. “Who are they?”

“The brainwashed slaves of angels,” Iwaizumi replies through gritted teeth. “You humans have tto stop putting angels on a pedestal, you know. They’re only using you.”

“And demons don’t?” Oikawa says, a wry smile twisting his mouth.

Iwaizumi chuckles and ruffles Oikawa’s hair. “Okay, fair. But at least we tell you. And give you a choice.”

“Are angels really that bad?” Oikawa asks. “The Christian Bible described them as striking fear into the hearts of men, but they’re never evil. They try to help.”

“Help who?” Iwaizumi asks, raising an eyebrow. “Humans? Are you sure? Aren’t they acting on orders from a higher power?”

Oikawa mulls that over. “But…”

“Don’t worry about it,” Iwaizumi huffs. “You won’t meet one. They speak through vessels and the Hunters, you will never encounter them.”

“What if I want to?” Oikawa protests.

Iwaizumi rolls his eyes. “Humans. You’re insatiable. Isn’t one demon enough for you?” He rolls off of the windowsill and onto Oikawa, forcing a graceless squawk from Oikawa.

“You’re heavy! A heavy, awful demon! You’re fat, Iwa-chan!” Oikawa cries.

“I prefer the term ‘plush,’” Iwaizumi teases, grinning with a mouthful of fangs.

“Gross,” Oikawa says, but allows Iwaizumi to curl around him instead of on top of him, letting the comforting warmth and steady rise and fall of an all-powerful being steady Oikawa’s own heartbeat and calm his fears about what the future would hold.

 

\----------------------------

 

Clouds hang heavy and low in the sky the following morning, setting Oikawa’s mood as gloomy as the weather. He tucks a scarf over his mouth, and shoves his hands in his pockets, refusing to walk close to Iwaizumi. Although Oikawa wants to believe that Iwaizumi is mistaken, he can’t argue with the threat to their safety. If Iwaizumi feels like he’s in danger, Oikawa has no room to debate the issue. He hates blindly following along, but he has little choice.

Iwaizumi hums sympathetically. “I could still be wrong,” he offers.

“Can it,” Oikawa says. “Let’s just get this interrogation over with.”

Kageyama, like Oikawa, lives close to their university out of convenience. It’s not too far of a walk, but long enough that when they round the bend to get to his house, Oikawa has worked himself up into an anxious ball of nerves. He picks up his pace, ready to get the confrontation over with and move out (move out!) if they had to.

“Stupid shitty magic,” he sniffs, finding that he’s blinking rapidly at the thought of moving away. “I just wanted to get my degree and work an honest career, now I can’t even finish undergrad.”

“Tooru—” Iwaizumi calls out to him, but is interrupted by a blast from ahead of them.

The volume of the blast catches Oikawa by surprise and he trips, falling flat on his ass. Iwaizumi rushes to his side, but Oikawa is already curled in a ball. He doesn’t know if it was a bomb or a gunshot or _what_ , but he is going to protect himself from the debris and—and god, why is it still making that awful noise?

Oikawa looks up as Iwaizumi crouches beside him, and his jaw drops. A column of rippling green-white _energy_ pierces the clouds and punches the ground somewhere in the distance—or was it the other way around. It roars like a jet plane and sends a blast of wind and heat out in every direction, enough to whip Oikawa’s hair back and make him squint. Was it…was it…?

“Magic,” Iwaizumi confirms. “And it’s coming from Kageyama’s house.” He pulls Oikawa to his feet. “Come on; we have to go.”

Much to Oikawa’s surprise, he starts running in the direction of the energy column, now tapering off into a thin line and fading away with the sound and wind and heat. “Go?” Oikawa calls. “Don’t you mean go _away_? Why are we running towards the danger?”

Iwaizumi halts. “Magic use in the eyes of normal people is illegal. It’s _illegal_ , Tooru.”

Oikawa’s blood runs cold. “We were wrong about Tobio,” he says, understanding.

“The Lightwood Society will come for him soon, we have to get him out,” Iwaizumi says. “Come on!”

Oikawa sprints to catch up with him.

There’s a crowd around Kageyama when they reach his house, because of course Kageyama has shit luck. Fortunately, it’s only a bunch of his elderly neighbors, and they seem more worried about the boy collapsed on the sidewalk, hunched over himself in a fetal position. Only the faintest chalk lines of a magic circle surround Kageyama’s shaking body.

“Excuse us, excuse us, please!” Oikawacalls, pushing past the crowd to get to Kageyama’s side. “Tobio, what happened?” he asks.

Kageyama doesn’t reply, just shakes his head slowly and curls tighter. “Please, we’re here to help,” Oikawa tries to mollify him, but Kageyama flinches from his touch. Oikawa looks to Iwaizumi, at a loss.

Iwaizumi crouches beside Kageyama, leaning in close enough that only the three of them could hear. “That was some outrageously illegal and powerful magic you used. You know the cost of breaking their laws. What the hell possessed you to risk your life like that?”

“I couldn’t…I couldn’t…not him, too,” Kageyama whimpers.

“Kageyama!” Iwaizumi snaps. “Pull yourself together!”

Kageyama stops shaking. Slowly, he uncurls from his defensive position, revealing his hands cupped around a tiny, tiny body.

“Is that—?” Oikawa starts.

“My robin,” Kageyama whispers. “The last of my robins.”

Oikawa glances over Kageyama’s shoulder, then wishes he hadn’t. Behind Kageyama, a ragged nest lies on the ground with five tiny, crumpled bodies surrounding it. Nausea rises sticky and hot in Oikawa’s throat. He turns back to the final chick, relieved to see its chest rising, slow as it was.

“Come on,” Iwaizumi says. “Let’s get inside.”

They shield Kageyama as they herd him inside, away from the prying eyes of his neighbors. The whole time, Kageyama cradles the baby robin close to his heart, as if parting from it would kill it. Iwaizumi shuts the door and Kageyama collapses into a chair, fingers quivering.

“Kageyama, what—” Iwaizumi starts.

He doesn’t finish, because another light fills the room, this time a soft, swirling healing energy—a combination of earth and wind and a touch of light magic. Something far too powerful for Kageyama to be able to handle, if he was indeed an amateur. The energy curls around the three of them, but centers on Kageyama’s hand and the tiny bird cradled within them. Iwaizumi runs over all the healing spells he knows in his head, but can’t think of any that manifest like _this._

Kageyama gasps, sharply, and his hands drop, as if weighed down. They must be weighed down, because the bird falls from his hands onto the floor, although it doesn’t look like a bird anymore. Its shape shifts and churns, shadowy and amorphous and surrounded by that misty magic that reflects bright in the eyes of the three in the living room.

And then, there are four.

The magic fades away, revealing a small, naked boy, his skin as tan as the back feathers of a robin and an unruly shock of orange hair the same shade as a robin’s head. He blinks open wide, frightened eyes and squawks at his three companions unintelligibly. The reality of the situation settles over the assembled like a blanket of calm.

“Kageyama Tobio,” Iwaizumi says slowly. “What the fuck did you _do_?”

 

**Author's Note:**

> i mean?? this is really such a tiny snippet of what i have in store and it's about to get 112% less serious, but tell me what you think???


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